Danske Bank MacCormack Cup semi-final: St Patrick’s, Armagh
v St Ronan’s, Lurgan (Friday, 5pm, St Paul’s Lurgan)
FRIDAY'S first semi-final of the MacCormack Cup should be a competitive affair between two new teams who have reached the final by contrasting paths.
St Ronan’s made light of the loss of ace free-taker Aidan McConville with a broken collar-bone in the opening game to go on and win the first three games and guarantee a semi-final spot as early as October 28. They were beaten by St Macartan’s in their final league game when they opted to try out something different.
By contrast, St Patrick’s looked badly off the pace in going down by 4-14 to 1-13 in their opening game against Enniskillen. However, nine days ago, they caused a huge upset by beating Maghera and then on Tuesday of this week a comfortable win over St Mary’s CBGS put them through to a derby semi-final.
Given the fact that Armagh haven’t won anything in recent times and, as a new school, St Ronan’s will likely want some silverware to re-enforce the progress they have made, this should be a good game and will be hard to call.
Danske Bank Corn na nÓg semi-final: St Patrick’s, Maghera 2-12 St Patrick’s, Cavan 3-8
WHAT a fantastic game of football Thursday’s Danske Bank Corn na nÓg semi-final in Pearse Óg, Armagh turned out to be.
It was settled in the third minute of injury-time when Maghera’s Michael Mulholland popped over a pressure free from 35 metres, just 30 seconds after Shane Tynan had missed a free from around the same range for Cavan.
From the start, this game was hotly contested and particularly during the last quarter when each time Maghera edged a point ahead, Cavan hit back with a score in the next attack.
The game began at a frantic pace, with Caolan McCabe first to hit the net with a Cavan goal in the 12th minute. Maghera responded with a goal from Shea Cassidy, after a good build-up involving Lochlainn Murray and Sean O’Neill. But they were rocked by goals in the 16th and 23rd minutes by Jack Turley and Fionntán O’Reilly, the latter strike putting the Breffni boys into a five-points lead.
Once again, Maghera created an opening and Michael Mulholland’s goal in the 28th minute left the score 3-4 to 2-5 in Cavan’s favour at the break. Dara O’Kane and Shane Tynan exchanged points at the start of the second half, before Cassidy narrowed the gap to a point, ahead of a 46th minute penalty award to his side. O’Kane took the spot-kick and opted for a point to level matters.
From then until injury-time, it was point-for-point, with Shane Tynan, Evan Kelly and Mark Sexton responding to two for Lochlainn Murray and another from Shea Cassidy. Then came the drama of two frees in the last minute of play, a Cavan miss and success for Michael Mulholland to see Maghera into next week’s decider where they will meet the winner of the Newry derby on Monday in Páirc Esler (12pm).
The last of the quarter-finals and first semi-final of the Danske Bank Rafferty Cup are down for decision on Friday. The quarter-final will see St Patrick’s, Armagh play Our Lady’s, Castleblayney in Middletown (1.45pm).
Armagh qualified for this stage before Halloween, but have had to wait on a play-off between Castleblayney and St Joseph’s, Crossmaglen at the end of last week, Our Lady’s eventually coming through that test by 5-18 to 1-11. However, Armagh, as clear winners of Group A, should be strong enough to make it through to play Virginia College, Cavan in the semi-finals at the start of next week.
Virginia defeated Patrician High, Carrickmacross by 3-10 to 1-8 earlier this week with goals from Sean McAvoy, Ryan Galligan and Seosamh Sheerin, a bit of a surprise given that Patrician had topped Group C and Virginia had trailed in behind Armagh and Bessbrook in Group A.
St Paul’s, Bessbrook took out St Ronan’s in the first of the quarter-finals at the start of last week. They now play what looks like a very hot St Malachy’s, Castlewellan side that defeated St Patrick’s, Keady by 4-18 to 0-8 at the start of the week.
St Malachy’s goalscorers were Sheelan Johnstone - younger brother of Kilcoo seniors Ryan and Jerome - Luke Savage, Shane Kearney and Ryan McAvoy, while Johnstone and Ryan O’Higgins weighed in heavily with points.
Ryan Hughes, who finished with 3-2, was the Bessbrook hero in the Armagh derby with St Ronan’s, shooting two goals inside 60 seconds close to the end to help St Paul’s to a 3-10 to 1-13 win.
On form Castlewellan look slight favourites to win on Friday morning in Saval (10.30am), but they were in the same situation last year and slipped up against St Ciaran’s, Ballygawley.
