Danske Bank MacRory Cup quarter-final
St Ronan’s, Lurgan 1-11 Patrician High, Carrickmacross 0-8
McCORMACK Cup champions St Ronan’s, Lurgan took a step closer to the final of the Danske Bank MacRory Cup following victory over Patrician High School in the Athletic Grounds last night.
The Lurgan men dominated the opening half but had to work much harder to secure the win in the second half, going 17 minutes without a score.
The platform for the win was set down in the opening 26 minutes of the game, during which they raised the white flag on nine occasions.
The Lurgan men took control of the game from the first whistle, firing over three points inside three minutes. Clann Eireann man Tiernan Kelly accounted for two of those scores. The lively Aodhan McConville hit the first of four first half points in the second minute before Kelly raced through to put St Ronan’s three up a minute later.
Patrician’s poor start continued as they went on to concede three more points before the quarter-hour mark. Rioghan Meehan hit a 30-metre point from play followed by frees from Aodhan McConville and Tiernan Kelly.
Carrickmacross had nothing to show up to this point bar four wides.
St Ronan’s pushed on to open up a 0-9 to 0-0 lead thanks to two further points from the dangerous Aodhan McConville preceded by an excellent score from corner-forward Kevin McAlinden.
Patrician full-forward Sean McEneaney eventually opened the Carrickmacross account in the 28th minute when his snap shot made its way over the St Ronan’s bar.
Playing with the wind at their backs in the second half, Carrickmacross opted to go much more direct and the tactic paid dividends as Andrew Woods, Sean McEneaney and David Garland all landed scores for the Monaghan school.
Midway through the second period, St Ronan’s lost wing half-back Tiernan Judge to a straight red, but Aodhan McConville steadied nerves to ease St Ronan’s six ahead once again.
Carrickmacross kept plugging away and with six minutes of normal time remaining reduced the Lurgan lead to just three points via a brace of points from Garland and a Dean Connolly point from 30 metres.
The numbers on the pitch were evened up seconds later as substitute Jack McMahon saw red for Carrickmacross for an off-the-ball incident.
As the game entered the last five minutes, Oisin Smyth and Garland swapped points before Ruairi McConville ended the contest finishing neatly to the Patrician net following a short free. The six-point win might well have been nine had Patrician goalkeeper Thomas Marron not pulled off an excellent save from Ruairi McConville.
St Ronan’s College:E Mulholland, J Haddock, J McAlinden, A Mulholland, T Judge, S McAlinden, A Loughran, B McCambridge 0-1, C Turbitt, R Meehan 0-1, T Kelly 0-3, J Haughey, K McAlinden 0-1, J Lenehan, A McConville 0-4
Subs: O Smyth 0-1 for Lenehan, R McConville 1-0 for A McConville, O Magill for McAlinden, C McDonald for Haughey
Patrician High School: T Marron, P Bermingham, M Connolly, T McCourt, C McNulty, K Slavin, C Marron, L Og Murray, C Murray, D Garland 0-4, A Woods 0-1, C McKeown, D Connolly 0-1, S McEneaney 0-2, E Walsh
Subs: S Duffy for McKeown, K Curtis for C Marron, S Kindlon for Bermingham, J McMahon for Duffy
Referee: C Branagan, Down
