Search Results for 'Joe McCann'

It was a somewhat disappointing World Championships for Mayo’s handballers overall, despite some fine performances the county drew a blank in terms of titles. Both Dessie Keegan and Joe McCann made surprisingly early exits from the feature Men’s Open event, Keegan losing out to Louis Moreno of the US while beaten finalist Alan Garner put paid to Joe McCann’s progress in the second round. Stephen Cooney lost out to Diarmuid Nash in the third round of the boys 19 and under, while he an Ian McLoughlin had a great run in the Men’s A doubles, only to lose out to the Tipperary-Tyrone combination of Ger Coonan and Caolan Daly at the semi-final stage.

The main provincial action of the past week concerned the various club competitions, two of which were decided at the weekend. All-Ireland 40x20 senior club champions Ballaghaderreen faced off St Coman’s in the provincial decider at Coman’s on Friday night last in a contest that went right down to the wire. Dessie Keegan opened proceedings for the Mayo side against Coman’s Chris Doolin and the duo played out two thrilling games. Keegan took the opener 21 aces to 18 but Doolin fought back to win the second 21-17 to give the host a one-point advantage. Vincent Moran teamed up with Stephen Cooney for the doubles leg and against Coman’s Ricky O’Gara and Niall McGrath. The normally reliable Moran and Cooney were far from their best against two reasonable if unspectacular ball players and the Mayo pair suffered defeat in both games on an overall 21-17, 21-15 scoreline to leave Ballaghaderreen 11 aces adrift going into the last singles. It was now up to Ballaghaderreen’s Joe McCann to rescue the situation as he took on Coman’s Damian Martin.

Ballaghaderreen claimed their fifth successive All-Ireland senior 40x20 club title at the expense of a game Coolboy of Wicklow at Abbeylara on Sunday last. Dessie Keegan opened for the Mayo side where he once again faced an in-form Michael Gregan. The Wicklow ace made life very difficult for the Mayo powerhouse in the first game, which he won comfortably 21 aces to seven. Keegan, at this stage a veteran of these team encounters, responded well in the second, which suffered a five minute delay due to a wet court, as he made his Wicklow opponent work much harder for each ace. Keegan took this game 21 aces to 15 to leave the Mayo side trailing by eight aces going into the doubles. Vincent Moran and Paul Flynn put in a fine performance to secure a good 21 aces to 12 win in the first game against Coolboy’s Pat Quaile and Michael Lennon. The second was a much closer affair which the Ballagh duo just won by a singles ace. With this slender advantage it was all up to Joe McCann who took on Johnny Willoughby in the final match of the afternoon. McCann was made to work very hard against a much-improved Willoughby and he did just that, winning the first game 21 aces to 17. This still left McCann needing 16 aces for victory in the final game of the evening. McCann kept a cool head and achieved the target at 16-14 to give Ballaghaderreen the well deserved victory. Much credit must go to the Coolboy lads who certainly pushed the Mayo champions all the way but overall Ballagh had the better balanced team on the day.