Club News

10/06/02 Costly win for St. John's footballers

St. John's footballers edged out a very physical Moneyglass side yesterday afternoon in a match marred by a series of shocking tackles and poor refereeing which left St. John's, and County Antrim, footballer John Kelly with a broken leg.

In terms of the actual quality of football played the match was scrappy. Both sides were inconsistent throughout the game though St. John's always seemed to have that little bit extra and managed to keep in front. Carl McCabe was very solid in centre-half back, Steven Miller tried very hard in midfield and Enda McKenna was at his industrious best in corner forward taking, as he did, the majority of scores for St. John's.

Moneyglass, perhaps conceding the lack of footballing ability in the side, approached the game with a tactic of hitting St. John's hard. This is, of course, all part of the game, however this tactic also involved late challenges and, on some occasions, reckless "clothesline" style tackles. This attitude ultimately worked for the team as the referee failed to stamp it out.

In the end, after being brought on for the last 10-15 minutes John Kelly, having only moments earlier been fouled heavily and brought down by his neck, was forced to ground by a full-blooded studs-showing tackle, which later it was discovered had broken his leg. Quite how the referee determined this challenge to be anything other than a sending-off offence is anyone's guess and the player was allowed to remain on the field.

In the last few minutes St. John's held onto their slender one point lead, Moneyglass failing to take any of their chances to equalise. Whilst the game finished up a 0-9 to 0-8 victory for the club's footballers they will now have to face St. Gall's in the championship without one of their county footballers, who will be out for the rest of the season.

 

		St. John's
		B. Mulgrew
M. O'Neill		R. McHugh	L. McCurdy
C. Anderson		C. McCabe	G. Clarke
		S. Miller J. Murphy
A. Press		J. Convery	C. Kelly
E. McKenna		N. Reynolds	G. Clarke
(Subs: D. Rafferty for L. McCurdy, E. Blaney for N. Reynolds, C. McClarnon for S. Miller, J. Kelly for A. Press)