St Brigid’s travelled to Sarsfield’s to play in the All County League Division 5 and came away on the wrong side of a one point defeat last Sunday.
The Malone Road Boys started well into the breeze and had created a couple of scoring opportunities which normally would have resulted in easily converted frees, but Jimmy King scorned the opportunity to convert his first three efforts before finally registering a score to tie the game on a point a piece. The second quarter saw the home team dominate the midfield sector and on the odd occasion St Brigid’s attacked, good approach work failed to be converted on the scoreboard.It took Brendan McDonald to score from play, five minutes before the whistle, before Naomh Brid doubled their score.
The half time score trailing 6 point to 2 meant that an uphill battle was on hand in the second half.
The first half introduction of Niall Cunningham did help around the midfield area, and his influence was much to the fore in the second half fightback, when he scored twice from frees and from play with additional scores from Chris Donnelly and Jimmy King. The decisive play of the game came from the home side wing half back who ran 50 metres on a solo run and finished from close range giving keeper Convery
no chance. Despite a late frantic rally that saw Donnelly hit the bar twice in quick succession and a golden opportunity to level from Mark Kelly on the final whistle, the Boys in blue left empty handed in this game.
Pluses from the match were great displays from Minor Ben Synott, and Eddy Smyth and Niall Cunningham. On another day like so many in the past the accurate boot of king from free’s would have been enough to earn the points, however the lack of a left footed free kick taker had a bearing on matters. Overall it was an improvement on the last number of challenge games and there is sufficient potential to make an impact in the league.
Team:T Convery, A kelly, E Smyth, C Mackle, B Loughran, A Owens, C Mooney, P McCrudden and D Horrisk, D McKeever, C Rodgers, M kelly, J king, B McDonald, R Mackle
Subs Used: Niall Cunningham, Ben Sinnott,C Donnelly, D McElholm, D McAlleenan
