O’Neills ACHL Division One 

Rossa 3-17-1-18 Loughgiel Shamrocks 

Kevin Herron reports from Paric Rossa 

Rossa hurlers maintained their winning start to the league campaign with a 3-17-1-18 win over Loughgiel on the Shaws Road on Saturday evening. 

The hosts asserted their authority quickly and quickfire Tiarnan Murphy points had them in the driving seat, Diarmaid Rogan extended his before the opening goal arrived inside of five minutes. 

Tiarnan Murphy cut out a sideline ball and tried to drop the ball over from inside the Loughgiel half, but it dropped out of the hand of Shea McDonnell and into the net. 

A further point followed by the older of the Murphy siblings- Deaglan, scoring the first of nine frees over the course of the evening. 

Loughgiel were eventually off the mark thanks to an angled Christy McGarry score, with Deaglan Murphy responding with a free. 

Shan McGrath was the source of many of the visitors’ scores, landing his sides second from a free- only for Deaglan Murphy to conjure his third score from the same scenario. 

Further points were traded between Caolan Blair and Murphy (free) before the Shamrocks hit a five-minute purple patch that yielded four scores unanswered. 

Donal McKinley popped over his first score of the half, McGrath clipped over his second free, Ronan McGarry tried to work a goal chance but his shot was diverted over and Christy McGarry doubled his tally with a shot from range that dropped over. 

Their hard work was undone however with Aodhan O’Brien opening his account for the evening and quickly doubling it with a goal. 

O’Brien cut out Enda Og McGarry’s crossfield pass and rifled low to the bottom corner to give his side a 2-8-0-7 lead. 

Deaglan Murphy made it four from four attempts in the aftermath, but Loughgiel finished the half strongly. 

Ronan McGarry doubled his tally with an impressive angled score, Shan McGrath helped himself to two further points from the placed ball and Rian McMullan popped over a nice point. 

Deaglan Murphy closed the half out with his fifth free as Rossa were 2-10-0-11 ahead at the midway point. 

Talisman Murphy landed his first point from play shortly after the restart- though Ronan McGarry saw a difficult angled shot sail between the posts. 

Frees were traded between McGrath and Murphy and points from play between Ronan McGarry and Aodhan O’Brien. 

The sides continued to cancel each other out with O’Brien and Rian McMullan trading further points and it wasn’t until the 42nd minute that Rossa had threatened to kill the game off with their third goal. 

Eoin Trainor took a pass from Daire Murphy and despite being caught on the arm on route to the target, he was able to pop a pass into the path of Aodhan O’Brien to lash home his second goal of the evening and make it 3-14-0-15. 

O’Brien would add a further point to his personal tally before departing- though things were far from settled as Rian McMullan flashed a shot to the net to make it 3-15-1-15 with more 12 minutes remaining. 

Rossa had to withstand a few late half chances with Conor Rocks parrying a further McMullan attempt and a Tiago McGarry shot was diverted to safety. 

Substitute also flashed a quickly taken free past the post – in between those chances a further Ronan McGarry point from play and a 65’ from Shan McGrath had saw the Shamrocks close the deficit to four. 

Deaglan Murphy eased any lingering nerves with an eighth conversion from the free and he would drop over 65’ to end his side’s scoring. 

A consolation point from McMullan didn’t alter the final outcome as Rossa made it three wins from three to join St Johns on the league summit at this early juncture.