ACFL Division 1
St. James 3-12 St. Brigid’s 4-14
Last year’s division 1 champions, St. Brigid’s kept in touch with the chasing pack when they travelled to Crumlin on Wednesday night and recorded a five point win over St. James’ Aldergrove.
The Musgrave Park side struck four first half goals to put themselves in a strong position and whilst the goals dried up in the second half they were always able to do enough to keep their noses in front.
Fergal Meenagh struck for St. Brigid’s first goal in the 9th minute after some clever build up play and the movement of the visitors attack was causing problems for the home defence.
It moved the visitors ahead for the second time in the contest after Seamus McGarry (free) and Christopher McStien (2pt) had moved Aldergrove 0-3 to 0-2 ahead and another McGarry pointed free left just one between the sides.
The visitors were beginning to open up the home defence with their intricate movement and they found the net again through Ryan Tweedy in the 16th minute and when Sean Logue took advantage of a mix-up in the St. James’ defence to add a third, it wasn’t looking good for the Crumlin side.
A fourth from Conan McNicholl with five minutes remaining to the break put St. Brigid’s in a strong position but Aldergrove were handed a lifeline when they were awarded a penalty and Seamus McGarry made no mistake from the spot.
That left it 4-5 to 1-8 in favour of the visitors as Mark O’Neill sounded his half time whistle but St. James were certainly not out of it though they would have noted the need to tighten up in defence for the second half.
It was Aldergrove who made the better start to the second half as Seamus McGarry brought his contribution for the evening to 1-5 from a free after 30 seconds but it brought a response from St. Brigid’s.
Reuben Carleton 2pt, Paul Bradley 2pt and Ryan Tweedy replied with points at the other end to move the visitors 8 ahead and Ronan Hanna from a free and Bradley exchanged further points to keep the gap at 8 at the end of the third quarter.
St. James were still battling hard and were rewarded for their efforts when they were awarded a second penalty which McGarry confidently converted and when Ryan McCarthy finished to the net with ten minutes remaining the gap was back to four.
That would be as close as St. James got however as Paul Bradley fisted over before Fergal Meenagh soloed 40 yards for a great individual point with Ronan Hanna converting two late frees and the impressive Bradley adding a final point for St. Brigid’s to conclude the scoring.
An excellent game of football where St. James certainly played their part despite ending on the losing side and the Crumlin men have matched it with the best this season.
The slick interchanging movement by the visitors in the opening half proved the difference in the end and their ability to create and finish goal opportunities saw them collect their 5th win with 2 draws with only one defeat in their 8 games to date.
Aldergrove: 1 Oisin McGarry, 2 Aiden Ervine, 3 Christopher Browning, 4 Emmer Irvine, 5 Declan Gough, 6 Chris McVeigh, 7 Eoin Gough, 8 Oisin Graham, 9 Conor Browning, 10 Gerald Mallon, 11 Seamus McGarry, 12 Christopher McStein, 13 Ryan McCarthy, 14 Ronan Hanna, 15 Cormac McGarry
St. Brigid’s: 1 Declan Heery, 2 Finn McKernan, 3 John Toner, 4 Conor King, 5 Fergal Meenagh, 6 Shea Downey, 7 Reuben Carleton, 8 Brian McGurk, 9 Jack Dowling, 10 Dara Quinn, 11 Oran Downey, 12 Paul Bradley, 13 Sean Logue, 14 Ryan Tweedy, 15 Conan McNicholl
Referee: Mark O’Neill
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