St Brigids Under 10 squad traveled to South Down to compete in the annual An Riocht tournament, an impressively organised event with teams from all over Ulster competing for the Jim Mulholland Cup.
St Brigids found themselves in a group of 5, first up was the highly fancied Hilltown based Clonduff, despite the panel being a couple players short due to an unavoidable late arrival of a couple of players, St Brigids took to the field, and took an early lead with a well taken point from Ben Power, his first of many on the day. However the lead was short lived as the Clonduff regrouped and scored a point straight from the restart. Despite the heroic efforts of Jack McGurk in goals Clonduff scored two more unanswered goals to leave the final score 2-1 to 0-1.
Second up was Darragh Cross who in their earlier game had run Clonduff close. St Brigids learning from their mistakes in the first game, went for it from the throw in with Peter King, Brian McCarthy and Peter Heaney making up the full back line, the St Brigids lads withheld some early Darragh Cross pressure, before playing the ball out calmly from the back. Power again (2), and Rory Brolly scored a some well taken goals, with Brolly also chipping in with a point. This left the tie well stacked in St Brigids favour. However Darragh Cross had other ideas as the mid Down lads pressed forward with a late rally and put over four points. The constant attention of Tom Dunsford and Patrick Mc Cann in the middle of the pitch guarding the back line, meant that long range scores were all the Darragh Cross lads were allowed to have. Final score 3-1 to 0-4.
Dromiskin were the next opposition, buoyed by their win, St Brigids confidence was restored, straight from the off the Malone lads played some great football, Michael Canavan and Cormac Barr were playing some great possession football at the top of the field, playing in the forwards to go into a two goal lead, industrious Thomas McCarney playing corner forward fed a great ball to Power for a late point from meant that St Brigids won comfortably 2-1 to a point.
Glasdrumman were the last group opposition as the race for places in the Cup heated up, Peter Henvey was released from his net minding duties to play outfield and he showed his outfield abilities as he sprayed long balls up to the corner forwards to Peter Carty and Eunan Carlin who worked the south Down lads defence hard. In the end it was comfortable win, meaning that St Brigids qualified for the Cup competition coming second in their group.
In the quarter final St Brigids were drawn against tough Armagh opposition in Clann Eireann, right from the off the Lurgan lads went for it and scored a spectacular goal in the first minute, this left the St Brigids lads reeling, and knocked them out of their stride. Another goal from Clann Eireann added to the pressure, however the south Belfast were not going to go down without a fight, and they responded with a goal well taken by John Morgan. With their confidence restored they laid siege to the County Armagh’s side goal, unfortunately with the clock ticking down the elusive equaliser did not materise.
An unlucky day for the St Brigids lads, but one that they enjoyed all the same.
