Prem.Minor 2 Hurling C/ship.1/4 Final.
2012-09-10 15:40:00
Fr.O Neills 2:13 v Sliabh Rua 2:12
We took on Sliabh Rua on Fri.night last in Ballinlough which was in excellent condition in the 1/4 Final of this years competition.Sliabh Rua were first on the score board with a pt.which we replied to with a Joe.Millerick pt.from a 65 but in a flash our opponents were to take a firm grip on proceedings when in a matter of minutes they had fired in 2 goals and as the saying goes "game on now Ger."We replied to this with another pointed 65 from Joe and a well taken pt.from Billy Dunne to settle us once more,with the exchanges tough but fair all over the field Sliabh Rua fired over another pt.we replied through Darragh Sexton with a well taken pt.which Sliabh Rua replied to firing over 2 more pts.of their own to keep their lead of 6pts with 15 mins.gone in the half.We then hit a purple patch scoring the next 5 pts.courtesy of 1 from play from Joe,3 from Paudie McMahon 2 frees and 1 from play and 1 from play from David O Driscoll to reduce the gap to 2pts again Sliabh Rua responded with 2 more pts.of their own but we were to finish the half the strongest scoring 2 more pts.through a free from Paudie and another well taken pt.from David,we drew level or so we thought with a 65 from Joe but for some strange reason the Referee disallowed it on the basis of some of our lads being in the small square which is perfectly legal once they are not interfering with play which they were not,still to go in at the break only a pt.behind after the concession of those 2 early set backs was most pleasing.We started the 2nd half in a positive mood with Paudie firing over a pointed free to tie the game but Sliabh Rua had ideas of their own and they duly scored the next 5 pts.to take a serious grip on proceedings,we were struggling in most areas of the field at this stage with the biggest problem being trying to get the ball into our inside frowards but perservere we did and when the ball broke to Billy Dunne he struck a great groud shot only for it to be disallowed the Ref.awarding a free out instead,again we were puzzled by this decision,then came a turning point in the game when a high ball into the square wasn't dealt with by their keeper young Deccie Dalton was on hand to bat it back in past him in the wink of an eye,this gave our lads renewed hope and with more and more pressure being put on the Sliabh Rua defence we were awarded a 20 metre free after we had scored what we thought was another perfectly legitimate goal courtesy of Aaron McEvoy,with about 3 mins.left on the clock,who was going to take it ? should we go for a goal ?,young Deccie took on the responsebility and before we knew it he had buried it in the back of the net to level matters once more.Wining possesion from the resulting puck out was vital and that we did with the ball breaking to Joe.Millerick out on the right wing he fired over one of the best taken pts.any of us had seen in a long while to put us in front for the first time in the game,with the clock ticking Sliabh Rua were awarded a free on their own half back line it was duly dispatched in the direction of our square and after a scramble we came out with the ball to clear the danger and in doing so the Ref.blew the final whistle and we recorded a fantastic victory to set up a semi-final meeting with our neighbours Killeagh/Ita's.
Team: E.O Neill,T.Millerick,A Kenneally,M.Motherway,Wm.Lane,M.O Keeffe,K.O Sullivan,J.Millerick 0:04,0:02 65's,A.McEvoy,P.McMahon 0:05,0:4 fr.,D.Sexton 0:01,K.Hegarty,B.Dunne 0:01,D.Dalton 2:00,D.O Driscoll 0:02.Subs:S.Lee for D.O Driscoll,K.Lee for K.O Sullivan,E.Motherway,D.Harrington,G.O Connell,S.O ConnorD.O Reilly.