Clonduff claim intermediate camogie crown against James Stephens

Clonduff (Down) 0-12 James Stephens (Kilkenny) 1-06

Sara-Louise Graffin fired over three points from play in Croke Park to lead Clonduff Shamrocks to victory over James Stephens and a second AIB Camogie All-Ireland intermediate club crown.

Having scored six points in last week's elongated semi-final win over Clanmaurice, Graffin also won a number of frees in a player-of-the-match performance today.

Paula O'Hagan converted those frees and she and Graffin, who both returned to action after starting a family earlier in the year -as did Graffin's sister Fionnuala Carr - presented a huge problem under the dropping ball for James Stephens.

Between them, O’Hagan and Graffin accounted for nine of the 12 points, but there were big performances too from Katie Morgan, Claire McGilligan and the Fitzpatrick sisters, as well as Clonduff physically dominating the first-time finalists.

The Kilkenny side played a sweeper and during the opening half this was quite effective. While Clonduff had the majority of the play over the opening 20 minutes the lead was just 0-5 to 0-1 and that was reeled in before the break.

Hannah Scott, Michelle Teehan and Sophie O'Dwyer all worked hard to stem the yellow tide, but the Down champions had learned from their last final in March 2019 and their game management was better than the Kilkenny side.

Two points from Graffin, two frees from O'Hagan and a fine individual score from Ceallagh Byrne had Clonduff four ahead but the game changed in the 25th minute when a harmless lob towards the Clonduff goal was blocked down into the path of Sophie O'Dwyer, who slid in to find the corner of the net.

O'Dwyer added her second point from frees and the teams turned around on level terms, 0-5 to 1-2.

Clonduff again dominated