St Cronan’s Have Footballers Aplenty!
The finals of the 5th and 6th class blitz in St. Cronans took place last Tuesday on the school pitch. 64 boys divided into 8 teams took part in the competition. Matches were played on the school pitch on Tuesdays and on Friday nights on Bray Emmets astro pitch.
Before proceedings could take place Darragh Rochford’s Kerry team had to play Mick O Gara’s Kildare at lunch time to decide who would meet Andrew Conway’s Wicklow team in the final. This was a very evenly contested match with both teams giving an incredible display of nonstop whole hearted football. Kildare eventually ran out winners 3-3 to 2-3.
The 1st final of the afternoon saw Conor Mulvaney’s Cork take on Ronan MacMahon’s Limerick. Exchanges were keen and there were some marvellous duals throughout the pitch. It was level pegging at half time but a stronger more determined Cork pulled away in the end.
Cork : C. Mulvaney, L. McHugh, L. Donnellan, Z. Cullen, F.O’ Loughlin, A. Temple, Philip, L. O Neill.
Limerick : R. McMahon, K. O’Connor, N. Eracelous, M. Timmons, B. King, C. Dunne, O.O’Toole, P. Cyfert.
In the 2nd final Dave Maloney’s Donegal took on Sid Hunt’s and Sean Byrne’s mighty Dubs .Defences on both sides were on top in this match Tony Jackson, Sam Kearney and Seán Fleming for Dublin ,Sam Whelan, Jamie Bagulay and Jamie Byrne for Donegal. Dublin having dominated the first half went in 2 points up but Dave Maloney’s never say die attitude was very much in evidence as Donegal came more and more into the game. Dublin’s captain Sid Hunt tried in vain to stem the tide but Donegal ran out eventual winners.
Donegal : D. Maloney, S. Brennan,S. Whelan, D. Romano, J.Byrne, J. Bagulay, S. Devlin, S. Cassoni, D. Murphy.
Dublin : S. Hunt, S. Byrne, S. Fleming, S. Delaney, T. Jackson, P. Aherne, L. Dunne, D. Martin ,S. Kearney.
Next up was Jordan Temple’s Galway versus Darragh Rochford’s Kerry. Another great game of football, end-to-end stuff with some exceptional movement and thrilling tussles. The Rochford brothers Darragh and Gavin were linking up well and along with Jordan Mortell were causing all sorts of problems for Galway. Jordan Temple led by example and got excellent support from Lochlann Megannety, Sam Byrne Conor Hardiman and Ronan Dobra. The teams were level at half time but better team work from Galway in the 2nd half saw them take the honours.
Galway: J. Temple, S. Byrne, R. Dobra, L. Megannety, B. Murphy, T. Connors, C. Hardiman, S. Illo, C. McKenna,
Kerry : D. Rochford, G. Rochford, R. Moran, S. Cox, J. Mortell, T. Mason, A. Bartley, Z. Jenciragin, J. Merrigan.
The grand finale saw Andrew Conway’s Wicklow face Mick O Gara’s Kildare. This turned out to be a captivating match with fortunes swaying back and forth and both teams enjoying periods of utter dominance. Sharp shooter Seán McDonagh opened the scoring for Wicklow with a peach of a goal from 30 metres out. O’Gara replied with 2 beautiful points before McDonagh slotted over another point to leave the score at half time Wicklow 1-1 Kildare 0-2 .Within two minutes of the second half Ryan Hanley collected a wonderful pass from Alex Griffin rounded the keeper and tapped into an empty net. Andrew Conway responded immediately for Wicklow with a rasper of a goal to again leave just 2 points between the teams. With time almost up Neil Gorman brought off a super save. Mark Fairbrother collected the breaking ball passed it on to Jake Daly who found O’Gara and he finished to the net. It was an amazing finish to a pulsating game. Ms. Maeve Tierney congratulated both teams on a wonderful game of football before presenting the cup to Kildare’s Winning captain Mick O Gara.
Kildare: M. O Gara, A.Griffin,. Hayde, J. Casey, R. Hanley, J. Daly, M. Fairbrother, N. Gorman.
Wicklow : A. Conway, R. Whelan, B.Daly, K. Sredojevic, R. Kilcullen, J. O Connor Cox, G. Henderson R. Houraghan, S. McDonagh.
A special word of thanks to school teachers Brian McNeice and Clare Dornan who made sure everything ran smoothly .Thanks also to Tommy Carroll who refereed the matches and who is doing great work in promoting our national games in the schools in Bray.
