KKG begin their campaign on a positive note after coming from behind to beat a determined Moindearg side with a composed second half display to win by a four-point margin.

It was a nightmare start for Kingdom as a bit of uncertainty and rustiness at the back led to goalkeeper Shaun Howard‘s hoofed clearance being returned into the danger area very quickly and fell to a Moindearg player who made no mistake in scoring a goal from close range.

KKG picked themselves up after that wake-up call and got points on the board from John Holly and Eoin Costello as the sides were swapping points for the first twenty minutes. This period of play was marked by some niggling fouls which culminated in an example being made of KKG’s full back, Andy Shanaghy, who was sidelined by being shown his second yellow card. An immediate re-jig saw forward Paddy Bleakley, who in warm up games had been scoring freely with both feet, slot into the full back line alongside Ivor Buckley and Mark Shanahan.

When half time arrived KKG were a point ahead as the scores stood at 0-06 to 1-02 but had been pressed throughout by some impressive hard running by Dan Downey and Cormac Costello which lead to well taken scores by Eoin Costello, Adrian Casey, Michael McMahon and Kevin Waldron.

At great pace, KKG replicated the great start that Moindearg had made to the first half by picking off a number of well-taken points in short order as Jacko Murphy and Alan Kenny came on as half-time substitutes for Dennis McNamara and Andrew Casey.

Points were exchanged between the teams over the next fifteen minutes with KKG pointing through Kevin Waldron, debutant starlet Ciaran McCallion and a couple for the Mick McMahon scrapbook. With the match evenly poised into the last quarter of an hour, KKG threw on the always controversial Colm Foody. Benefiting from some questionable umpiring, Foody rose to the occasion with a tightly angled point and a (very) close range goal to which the men in maroon and white had no answer. His contribution proving the difference between the sides at the final whistle put a marker down that the watching scouts from KKG’s next opponents, Fulham Irish, will not have missed.