Report by James Reilly
A last quarter scoring burst that yielded 2.4 gave St Peter’s Dunboyne a hard-earned victory over a depleted Loughcrew Gaels/Gaeil Colmcille side in this Round 3 Under 21 A match played in good conditions on Sunday morning in Grangegodden. With the hosts fielding without the injured Tom Shine and Matthew Farrelly and a number of others carrying various injuries from the recent fixture overload it was the visitors playing into a strong wind who made the better start and led by 0.3 to 0.0 after 8 minutes. Daire Shine from a 65 opened the hosts account in the 10th minute and followed up almost immediately with a well taken point from play. Jamie Casserly goaled in the 15th minute to put the hosts 1.2 to 0.3 ahead. Points were exchanged from placed balls before 4 successive points – 3 from Shine and another from Oisin McDermott gave the hosts a 1.6 to 0.4 lead at the interval.
With the strong wind in their face and the increasing number of injuries starting to take its toll the hosts knew they faced a difficult second half. However, they defended heroically for the first 15 minutes and restricted the visitors to 5 points – 3 from frees to leave the match tied 1.6 to 0.9. However a fortuitous goal on the 17th minute finally broke the home side’s resistance and St. Peter’s went on to add a further 1.4 with a Shine free in the 26th minute being the only response from the hosts.
Despite the result this was another brave team performance by the depleted Gaels side and wasn’t lacking hard work, attitude and determination. Everyone tried their best and gave their all but after so many recent games, the resultant injuries and a lack of numbers to allow for substitutions to be made eventually took its toll.
Loughcrew Gaels/Gaeil Colmcille: T McKeon, L Finnegan, J Connell, S Thornton, C Rennicks, D Shine (0.6), E Briody, S. Tunney, O McDermott (0.1), K Og Lynch, C O’Reilly, C Murphy, C McGovern, J Casserly (1.0) H Corcoran.
Subs: R Early for Briody.
