Antrim Senior Football Championship Group 3
St Ergnats Moneyglass 1:12 v St. Mary’s Ahoghill 1:14
Ahoghill secured their place in the knockout stages of the Senior Football Championship with a two point victory over neighbours Moneyglass at Portglenone on Friday night. This was a keenly anticipated encounter for all involved with each a victory to their name against Glenravel and Moneyglass just missing out last time out against Portglenone and to be fair, there was some very good football played in spells throughout by both sides.
It was Ahoghill who struck first with James O Connell firing over 2 points in succession to give the men in red the lead after 5 minutes, he was to go on to have a major influence in this one finishing with a personal tally of 1-7. Moneyglass responded well once settled and Aidan Mc Erlain found the Ahoghill net to open their account. They capitalised on their goal and with the pace of Moneyglass’ young lads up front they linked up well and Sean Boyd added 2 of his own after 7minutes to increase the lead.
However it wasn’t to last long, a high looping ball into the Moneyglass defence was well gathered again by James O Connell and from what looked to be an innocent enough effort at a tackle was deemed a pull by referee Mark O Neill who awarded a penalty to Ahoghill and duly converted by O’Connell, he would add 2 more frees just before the half time whistle to take the slenderest of leads.
The second half started brightly, Ronan Graham firing over from a free and O’Connell adding another 5 minutes in. With daylight fading it was all to play for. There was never more than a few scores separating the sides at any time throughout this one as each exchanged points Connor O Kane, Aidan Mc Erlain and Colm Duffin for St. Ergnats and Patrick Dougan and Ronan Graham for Ahoghill. With minutes remaining it was Ahoghill who would finish this one out the stronger and again O Connell finding his range from the place ball added another to setup a meeting with Champions Cargin next time out.
St Ergnats: Jamie Mc Laughlin, Matthew Mullan, Calum Mc Stocker, James Mc Cormick, Fergal Duffin, Paul Duffin, Kevin Mc Cann, Dermot Mc Erlain, Michael Mc Laughlin, Connor O Kane (0-1), Connlaodh Mc Cann (0-1) Conor Boyd (0-2, 1f), Sean Boyd (0-2), Aidan Mc Erlain (1-1m), Colm Duffin (0-5f)
Subs: Tiernan Mc Cormick for M. Mc Laughlin, Ryan Boyd for C. Mc Stocker, Tyler Cassidy for Sean Boyd
Ahoghill: 1 Noel Crossey, 2 Eamonn Brady, 3 James Magee, 4 Bernard Graham, 5 Seamus McKeever, 6 Diarmaid Graham, 7 Fionnbar O’Neill, 8 Neil O ‘Connell, 9 Ronan Graham, 10 James O’Connell, 11 Patrick Graham, 12 Donal Graham, 13 Dan O’Neill, 14 Patrick Dougan, 15 Conor Paul Crossey.