Under 16 A Hurling Championship final

Loughgiel 5-13 St Paul’s 3-8

by John McIlwaine

Loughgiel won their first Under 16 Hurling title in eleven years when they beat St Paul’s in Wednesday night’s final at Quinn Park, Ballymena. A highly talented Shamrocks side were in control for most of the game and after leading 4-7 to 1-5 at the break they pushed on to win with relative ease in the end. The St Paul’s side contained a lot of very good hurlers as well and to their credit they battled to end, but they just hadn’t enough to match their north Antrim opponents who had strong players throughout the field.

Loughgiel went ahead within seconds of the throw-in when centre forward Michael McGarry soloed through to score an excellent point on the run. Rian McMullan added another soon afterwards and when Conor McCormick’s shot from out on the wing deceived the St Paul’s goalkeeper and dropped into the net the gap was out to five. Dylan Devlin had the gap out to six by the time St Paul’s got their first score, a goal from full-forward Caolan McKernan, and when the full forward added a point the gap was back to just two. The Shaw’s Road boys kept in touch as Caolan Duffin and Caolan Crossan matched scorers by Loughgiel’s Dylan Devlin and Michael McGarry but all was to change when Loughgiel hit two goals within a minute, the first from Odhran McGrath and the second fifty seconds later from Rian McMullan. Those proved two body blows from which St Paul’s could not recover and Loughgiel went on to lead by 4-7 to 1-5 at the break.

Four unanswered points at the start of the second half from man of the match Michael McGarry (2), Rian McMullan and substitute Christy McGarry all but sealed the result. There was a bit of a shoot-out between the two number 11s as Loughgiel’s Michael McGarry and St Paul’s Caolan Crossan hit some great scores from both frees and open play, some of McGarry’s scores coming from well inside his own half. Crossan grabbed a goal for St Paul’s in the 48^th minute to give his team a boost but less than a minute later substitute Conor O’Mullan grabbed one at the other end as found the net despite being on his knees.

McGarry and Crossan continued their personal scoring battle with two points each before Crossan grabbed his team third goal to bring his personal tally to 2-5. However it was about Loughgiel as the young Shamrocks finished strong to seal the first Under 16 county title since 2006.

Loughgiel scorers – Ryan McGarry 0-9; Rian McMullan 2-1; Christy McGarry 1-1; Dylan Devlin 0-3; Conor McCormcik 1-0; Odhran McGarath 1-0; Cathal Hargan 0-1

St Paul’s scorers Caolan Crossan 2-5; Caolan McKernan; Ruairi Hamill 0-2.

Loughgiel

Kevin McAuley, Conor Henry, Ruairi McCloskey, Christie Dickson, Ryan Dallas, Declan McCloskey, Tiernan McAlonan, Cathal Hargan, Shane O’Boyle, Dylan Devlin, Michael McGarry, Rian McMullan, Conor McCormick, Ohdran McGrath, Damian Quinn.

Subs – Christie McGarry, Enda Og McGarry, Tiernan McCaughan, Conor O’Mullan

St Paul’s

Michael Duffy, Aaron Carey, Dara Stevenson, Chaiolfhionn O’Neill, Dylan Flynn, Alan Hyndman, Mark Munce, Niall Martin, Gary McGroarty, Caolan Duffin, Caolan Crossan, Michael Murphy, Caolan McKernan, Cillian McGarry.

Referee – Kevin Parke