St Eunan’s completed a historic Donegal senior hurling league and championship double for the first time in almost 50 years when they defeated Setanta by a point at O’Donnell Park in the county championship final on Saturday.
They defeated the Killygordon side in the fixture at the third time of asking, winning 2-9 to 0-14 after falling short in the two years previous.
The Eunan’s defence stood strong after the Cathedral town men started off the strongest of the two sides and held onto the lead for the duration of the game to earn the side their first Donegal SHC title since 1972.
The two goals that the Letterkenny team scored proved to be key as no individual player had more than one score from play for the side.
A Russell Forde goal had helped give Eunan’s a six-point lead before Setanta had got their first score.
The side from Killygordon got into the game eventually but the challengers’ defence and some inspirational scores gave them a half-time lead of 1-6 to 0-5.
Setanta started the second half strongly and were beginning to reel Eunans in but a super team goal that saw the sliothar in seven Eunans players’ hands ended with Kevin Kealy striking to the net.
Previous to this, goalkeeper Cian Hennessey had saved Eunan’s blushes with several important stops.
Their second goal returned their lead to six points and the defending champions rallied once more to get within a point of Eunans.
However, heroic work from the 14 Letterkenny men behind the sliothar saw the side hold out for their first SHC triumph in 49 years.
The shock win on Saturday brought an end to Setanta’s dominant two-year reign in the competition.
The championship victory is the icing on top of a fantastic year for the side, who had previously won the league in July.
