Club News
05/06/02 Understrength hurlers too strong for St. Galls
Whilst the senior hurlers were missing around 7 players from the team
who had dispensed with Ballycran some five days earlier this was still
a comfortable victory by all accounts.
With two players heading to the States for the summer (apparently signing
up for lucrative deals with Nike), a further four on holiday and one unfortunate
individual who had "knocked himself out" the day before - it
was an opportunity for a few of the fringe players to enjoy first team
hurling and stake their claim to a first team place.
It was a youthful St. Galls team who lined out in Corrigan Park for this
fourth match of the Antrim Cup, however they failed to start for at least
15 minutes after the throw in. St. John's put over a number of unanswered
points before St. Gall's finally managed to put a point on the scoreboard,
and in general they were outplayed all over the field.
Following on from his fine display against Ballycran Donal O'Hara caught
a high percentage of the puck outs, which in turn limited the amount of
balls coming through into the St. John's defence. Paul Montgomery put
in another strong performance of scoring prowess, whilst a welcome addition
to the defence came in the form of John Kelly - making his first appearance
for the senior hurlers in four years and he acquitted himself well for
someone who has been out of the fray for so long.
One of the standout performances in the defence however came from Neil
Kelly at corner-back who outplayed his man in every move, covered the
full back well and made some important clearances during both halves.
Whilst St. Gall's began to find some improved scoring consistency in
the second half, from the likes of Karl Stewart, they never looked like
overtaking the senior hurlers and it was the difference of two goals in
the end which saw St. John's record a third successive win in the Antrim
Cup. The match finished up 2-9 0-9.
|
|
St. John's |
|
| |
C.Cunningham |
|
| N. McCallin |
C. Gannon |
N. Kelly |
| J. Kelly |
K. Rafferty |
G. Clarke |
| |
|
D. O'Hara
H. Kennedy |
|
| L. McCurdy |
R. Heenan |
C. Thompson |
| B. Moss |
P. Montgomery |
G. Hamilton |
| (Subs: S. O'Hara for B. Moss) |
|
