Wexford 0-17

Galway   1-23

In excess of 14,000 people witnessed Galway run riot in the penultimate game in the round robin section of the Leinster Championship on Saturday evening at Innovate Wexford Park.

The tone for this game was set in the first 90 seconds, Galway’s Padraic Mannion, unchallenged, raced through the Wexford defence, Mark Fanning made a brilliant save but the rebound was struck to the back of the net by Conor Whelan.

Wexford never recovered from that early setback, the Galway forwards dominated in the air and the home side’s defence had little to offer in this sphere. The Tribesmen tactic was very simple, route one, James Skehill’s puckout’s landed like Exocet missile’s down on the Wexford rearguard.

Conor Cooney pointed, before Rory O’Connor opened the scoring for Wexford from a placed ball in the 7^th minute. Joe Canning with another point to stretch the Galway lead, before Paudie Foley and Paul Morris narrowed the margin to 4 points.

The “Joe Show” is box office stuff, the Portumna clubman, scored another 3 points before halftime, including a fabulous side line cut. Rory O’Connor also pointed and Galway headed to the dressing room 6 points to the good, 1-12 to 0-9.

Lovely Joe Canning side line cut pic.twitter.com/oOLxfn4JZT

— The GAA (@officialgaa) June 2, 2018

Wexford needed to start the second half with a bang, but again it was the Connacht men who were fastest out of the blocks, Conor Whelan with a quick point, and then Canning with another fantastic side line cut over the bar.

The Portumna man tagged on another 3 points to increase the lead to 10 points, game, set and match.

Rory O’Connor was best for the homeside, scored 12 points, 10 frees, Paul Morris and Aidan Nolan, two each, and Paudie Foley got one. Many of the Wexford big guns did not perform, much has been made of the players being tired as this was their third consecutive weekend to play, but one has to wonder if its more to do with Galway being head and shoulders above every other team in the country, we may be well looking at one of the all time great teams (only time will tell).

The three weekends on the bounce got me thinking, our club players in Wexford must have Superman levels of fitness as when the club championship returns, any club trying to do the double (hurling and football) will be required to play 13 weekends on the trot!!!!

Wexford only managed to score 7 points from play against Galway, but it should be remembered that Kilkenny only scored 1-2 from play against Galway- so we clearly have the advantage?

Next weekend’s clash with Kilkenny is basically a Leinster semi-final, but the winner’s prize will be another mauling at the hands of the Tribesmen, so one has to ask the question, is it better to loose that game?

Scorers –

Galway: J Canning 0-12 (8f, 2 s/l), C Whelan 1-2, C Cooney 0-4, N Burke and D Burke 0-2 each, J Flynn (1f) 0-1. 

Wexford: R O’Connor 0-12 (10f), P Morris and A Nolan 0-2 each, P Foley 0-1.

Galway: J Skehill; A Tuohy, D Burke, J Hanbury; P Mannion, G McInerney, A Harte; J Coen, D Burke; C Mannion, J Cannning, J Cooney; C Whelan, J Glynn, C Cooney. Subs: J Flynn for J Glynn (54), N Burke for J Cooney (58), B Concannon for C Mannion (66), S Linnane for Hanbury (68), D Glennon for Canning (70).

Wexford: M Fanning; D Reck, L Ryan, S Donohoe; P Foley, M O’Hanlon, D O’Keeffe; K Foley, A Nolan; L Chin, S Murphy, J O’Connor; P Morris, R O ‘Connor, C McDonald. Subs: Conor Firman for Donohue (h-t), L Og McGovern for J O’Connor (48), H Kehoe for K Foley (51),