Danske Bank McDevitt Cup final: St Malachy’s, Belfast v St Patrick’s, Keady (Wednesday, St Patrick’s Banbridge, 4pm)
ST Malachy’s, Belfast go into Wednesday’s Danske Bank McDevitt Cup final with a lot of expectation after they were comfortable winners over their final opponents St Patrick’s, Keady in a group game before Halloween.
That 4-7 to 2-5 victory put them on the way to topping
their group, scoring an average of four goals per game. That average rose in the knock-out series with a 6-10 to 2-4 win over Carndonagh in the quarter-final and then a narrow 4-10 to 4-9 victory a couple of weeks ago to fend off a south Armagh derby final between Keady and Crossmaglen.
Harry Feeney and Ollie Gregory form the spine of the defence with Harry’s absence through injury in the semi-final probably impacting on that game.
Layden O’Neill and Ethan Connelly have formed a good midfield pairing with O’Neill’s basketball skills proving very useful under the high ball. Captain Tiernan Conway from Bredagh and another of the Niblock clan from St Gall’s, Ronan, lead that attack that has delivered all those goals.
The early defeat meant that Keady had to regroup for their other games and they did well enough against Aquinas and St Louis, Kilkeel to set up a quarter-final against Moville. After that came their best performance of the competition to date, a 4-16 to 1-8 victory over Virginia Cavan, although it was only in the last ten minutes that they actually pulled clear.
The south Armagh team is backed by players from Middletown and Keady while Ballymacnab’s Jack Keegan has been a good outlet for scores. Defender Johnny Loughran and captain Rory Mullan will be key players if Keady are to go one better than last season when they lost the JJ Reilly Cup final to St Mark’s, Warrenpoint.