McGoldrick says it's a big boost for the club as they head to Croke Park

Such was the case on Sunday as he started off in his natural position early in the first half but as the game wore on he drifted back to sweep across the back line. Along with his defensive colleagues he helped to shut out Sylane setting up a Croke Park final emulating the footballers and camogs.

“It’s a big boost for the club, we’re a very united club, I mean our football managers have been with us, one of them spoke with us before we left the clubhouse this morning and the other was helping out on the sideline there today,” he said. “Its great to be a part of this, the camogs and footballers got to their finals and now the hurlers will have too.”

The defensive performance by the Eoghan Rua men was enormous while the hard working forward line found chinks of space to punish Sylane, none more so than Ciaran Gaile.

“Yeah it was, it worked out all right for us, they actually withdrew a couple of boys to sweep back so in the second half so there was a bit more space to move the ball out from defence,” said McGoldrick.

“Our forwards did really well despite being outnumbered, they managed to get some space and got some great scores. Ciaran’s doing really well, he’s got himself into great shape, he’s just gone in with the Derry hurlers this year and that has helped him.

“Yeah I suppose the fitness is there, we’ve done a lot of work over the last couple of months and it seemed to stand to us at the end.”

The Eoghan Rua centre forward heaped praise on long standing manager Padraig Ó Mianain who has been in charge of the senior squad for a number of years now.

“Padraig has put in an awful amount of work into this, not just in the last couple of months but with a number of teams, including ourselves as the senior team over the last number of years,” he said.

“He has been there just trying to keep things going, he really has had an impact on everyone in that changing room from us older ones from a young age right through to the younger boys like Tomas (Magee), Pearse (Dallas), Paddy (Mullan), Ciaran (Gaile), the two Ruaris (Mooney and Leonard), I mean I could go right thorough the whole panel. Its great for Padraig to be looking forward to a day in Croke Park, I just hope we can go on now and win it for him.”