Sigerson Cup round three: St Mary’s UC v Maynooth University (today, Davitt’s, 2pm); Ulster University v MTU Cork (tonight, Abbotstown, 7pm)
TODAY it is knockout for real for both St Mary’s and Ulster University as the Sigerson Cup reaches its make or break stage. Win today and it’s the quarter-final stage, lose and that’s Sigerson done and dusted until 2023.
UU’s first round game with NUI Galway was abandoned in unusual circumstances a fortnight ago due to a serious injury to Galway player Sean Mulkerrins. The northerners were trailing by two at Whitehall with 58 minutes played when Mulkerrins suffered a worrying looking knee injury – and with an ambulance taking half-an-hour to arrive, the teams agreed that NUIG would be awarded the victory.
UU blasted out of the traps early in that 1-10 to 2-5 defeat with Down pair Séamus Loughran and Andrew Gilmore impressing from the off. Full-forward Niall Loughlin got himself a goal that day in Dublin, while Tyrone’s Ruairí Gormley and Karl Gallagher also impressed at points.
The Jordanstown side were wasteful in front of the posts, however, when you consider the scoring opportunities they had and they will have to be more ruthless tonight against an MTU Cork side who lost to neighbours MTU Kerry in the last round.
While Cork inter-county attacker Damien Gore could provide problems to deal with tonight, UU should have enough about them to make the last eight.
St Mary’s were left heartbroken by last week’s last gasp defeat to reigning champions DCU at Davitt’s. Gavin McGilly’s men were leading by two with a minute to go but a last minute penalty conversion from Red Óg Murphy saved the Dubliners’ blushes.
The Ranch kicked just the one wide over the course of that 1-14 to 1-13 defeat and could do with a similar level of accuracy this afternoon against Maynooth. St Mary’s have made much of their togetherness and fighting spirit allowing them to punch above their weight in this competition, but the likes of Ryan Coleman, Thomas O’Kane, Micheál McConville, Cormac Murphy, Cian McConville and Conor McConville demonstrated last week that they are not without a certain amount of quality into the bargain.
Maynooth were impressive in last week’s clash with TU Dublin at Grangegorman, emerging 4-9 to 1-11 victors. Three goals in the opening 20 minutes from midfielder Darragh Warnock and forward Dan Lynam (two) laid the foundations for that win and St Mary’s would do well to be wary of the attacking threat posed by that duo, Billy Maher and Shane O’Sullivan.
