Flashes from under 14s fail to dazzle Naomh Conaill

Under 14 football league
Aodh Ruadh 3-3
Naomh Conaill 4-13
1 April 2013
Father Tierney Park

This game, played in blisteringly cold conditions at Father Tierney Park, saw Aodh Ruadh play in patches, but never anywhere near long enough to trouble a decent Naomh Conaill outfit.

Aodh Ruadh won the toss and played with a big following wind in the first half into the Rock Hospital end. The homesters had the better of the wind assisted opening stages and were 0-2 to 0-1 up at the end of the first quarter, but could have been further ahead had they made more of their chances. The first score was a rather beautiful free from Shane Dorrian which he coaxed over the bar from distance in the sixth minute. Three minutes later a good phase of Aodh Ruadh play was finished with a close range point from Odhrán Kennedy. Glenties finally opened their account when a Nathan Byrne free rebounded from the cross bar and was collected by Byrne who made no mistake at the second time of asking.

After that Naomh Conaill began to ramp up the pressure and drew a brilliant save from Mark Gallagher after he was isolated one-on-one in the 14th minute. Just a minute later and Gallagher pulled out another brilliant save, but Joe O'Donnell was quickest to react and he vollied home the rebound.

Manus McDyre scooped over a point befor a raking move saw McDyre adding to his tally with the simplest of tap ins.

With four minutes left in the half Shane Dorrian showed a great turn of speed to engineer himself a shooting opportunity which he executed well.

However two minutes later the gap was stretched again. Mark Ward pulled off another outstanding reaction save however Aodh Ruadh were too slow to react to the rebound once again and Nathan Wright just had to tap home to send the visitors in leading by 0-3 to 3-2.

Naomh Conaill were much more clinical than Aodh Ruadh with the breeze and in the early stages of the second half five unanswered points gave them a 13 point cushion.

It was then that Aodh Ruadh cast off the shackles and became more enterprising in their attack play. They turned the screw on Glenties and were rewarded with three goals in three minutes. The first goal came in the 43rd minute when a Dylan Gallagher drive was bundled home by Caolán Dolan who made judicious use of the new square ball rule.

Then a minute later Shane Dorrian lashed another low shot in on target and this time the ball, very difficult to handle in the dry conditions, simply slipped through Conor Breslin's hands and between his legs into the net.

The best of the three goals came a minute later when Sean Taylor unleashed a rasper of a shot that didn't give the Naomh Conaill net minder a hope.

Those three goals took Aodh Ruadh to within four points of the visitors and with the infusion of belief Ballyshannon played much better football. However they were unable to add further scores and after a rally that lasted eight minutes, all told, Naomh Conaill were able to lift the seige with a Jack Flannery free on 48 minutes.

That free was followed by an unanswered 1-4 from Glenties before Pat Walsh sounded his final whistle with the score reading Aodh Ruadh 3-3 Naomh Conaill 4-13.

Mark Gallagher had a good game between the posts for Aodh Ruadh, pulling off a string of excellent saves. Barry Kelly and Conal Sweeny both put in creditable performances while Sean Taylor put in a great shift at midfield and was a great attacking threat too. Meanwhile up front Shane Dorrian was the most dangerous of Ballyshannon's attackers.

Best for Glenties was Odhrán Doherty who never allowed the homesters to develop any attacking momentum and Nathan Byrne who was the most dangerous threat in an industrious full forward line.

Vital Statistics
Aodh Ruadh
Mark Gallagher; Shane Gillespie, Barry Kelly, Patrick McCafferty; Cian McGloin, Conal Sweeny, Pauric Keenaghan; Dylan Gallagher, Sean Taylor (1-0); Odhran O'Neill, Shane Dorrian (1-2, 1f), Michael McKenna; Evan McTernan, Odhrán Kennedy (0-1), Caolán Dolan (1-0). Substitutes: Jason Patterson, James Sheerin.
Naomh Conaill
Conor Breslin; Kevin Gavigan, Cian Doherty, David Moore; Keelan McGill, Odhrán Doherty, Nathan Wright (1-0); Ryan Hunter (0-1), Oran McDevitt (1-0); Joe O'Donnell (1-0), Jack Flannery (0-3, 1f), Kealan McMonagle (0-2); Manus McDyre (1-3), Nathan Byrne (0-4). Substitutes: Sean Coughlin, Cahir McDevitt, Michael McKenna, Joe Smith, Mark Burke.

Last modified: Monday, 1 June 2020 at 12:11pm