It’s no wonder Darren Gleeson didn’t stand a chance with Reid’s rocket at Croke Park yesterday.
In fairness, when the sliotar is struck at a whopping 177.5 kilometres per hour (just over 110 mph), there are few ‘keepers in the country who’d keep it out and while we’re not exactly sure whether it was for his goal that he struck the sliotar at that speed, there’s a pretty good chance that it was. What a bullet. Not as quick as one of his efforts during the All-Ireland semi-final victory over Limerick, mind, but still unbelievably fast all the same.
That stat is just one of a number of interesting figures to emerge from yesterday’s absorbing All-Ireland semi-final, as is illustrated in the graph below by Liberty Insurance, sponsors of the All-Ireland Hurling Championship.
Now that you’ve taken a deep breath, take a closer look how tight this All-Ireland Final was during the 70mins. #GAA pic.twitter.com/rNgj7r5o6F
— Liberty Insurance (@LibertyIRL) September 8, 2014
To be fair to John ‘Bubbles’ O’Dwyer, he hits the ball nearly as hard as Reid, while there was barely anything to separate the teams in areas like puck outs won, contested clean catches and pass completion rate.
Thank God we get to do it all over again in three weeks’ time.
