PREDICTION: St Laurence's to hold off the Kildare IFC's surprise package Two Mile House

Last year’s relegated side from the SFC, St Laurence’s, have got themselves back to within two wins of the big time but they must first tackle the surprise package of this year’s Kildare IFC, Two Mile House. These teams face off on Saturday October 4 at 2pm in Manguard Park, Hawkfield.

There is an easy place to start in this analysis, with these sides’ first meeting in this year’s IFC in Round One of the group stages. St Laurence’s emerged as 1-19 to 0-14 victors on the day as they bounced back from their surprising Preliminary Round defeat to Ellistown.

That being said, Larries haven’t been overly impressive and, like their semi-final opponents, have lost a Championship proper game, coming up short to a Kilcullen side that Two Mile House made light work of with a 1-16 to 0-8 win. Nevertheless they are getting the job done so far. Conversely, Two Mile House have vastly improved since that opening day and, whether the result is the same or not, the dynamics and unfolding of this fixture will be very different this time around with Semi-Final pressures and a seemingly buoyant underdog outfit.

Larries beat Castledermot last time out and needed extra-time to do so with Larries struggling to score from open play in this game. TJ Nolan and Felix Lawlor set-pieces did much of the heavy lifting on the scoreboard as they got over the line against a patchy at best Castledermot outfit. Larries’ lack of standout showings in this Championship will be viewed in one of two ways depending on their result in this Semi-Final. If they exit, the chatter goes that ‘this was always coming’ given their meagre showings and if they win unremarkably ‘they are still getting the job done’.

The reality is that they are a hard team to pin down in terms of quality, their presence in a losers group perhaps lightened their load in group stage action but they were still met with stiff challenges in Group C.

One in the positive column is that they are averaging just shy of 20 points (19.75) a game in the Championship proper. That gives them a slight edge over Two Mile House with their opponents popping over an average of 17.6 across their five games and conceding an average 14 points a game, slightly less than Larries’ 14.5 points concession average. Key to success for both sides in this game will be discipline with each outfit bringing in major returns from their set-piece activity.

Two Mile House reached this stage with a commanding win over perennial dark horses Rathangan, who topped a tricky Group A. It was all about goalkeeper Didier Cordonnier in their Quarter-Final win, who knocked over 0-13, including five two-point frees, of their 0-20 tally. The House conceded just 1-10 against a previous electric Rathangan attack whose lowest Championship score prior to their meeting was 2-16. A result which came directly after reducing Round Towers to 0-10.

Neither of these sides have a singular outstanding scoring outlet but this writer’s instincts say that Cordonnier will need to be in fine sharpshooting form once again if The House are to reach the final with their attacking output. Likewise at the other end, TJ Nolan will be Larries’ best foot forward and him showing up in this final four clash will be a huge part of their success or failure.

Perhaps a redundant assertion, but a game of this magnitude could come down to who can hold their nerve in the big moments

This game is tougher to call with no certainty surrounding either side’s Championship credentials, but Larries should have enough to progress past The House in this one, having done so already this year.

Prediction: St Laurence’s

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