06/03/04 Under 16 Johnnies 'unlaoised' in Mount Rath

Mount Rath, Laois 6:03 St. John's, Antrim 4:09 St. John's U-16's opened the Club's Laois Tour with an enjoyable encounter with the Laois Division 1 outfit Mount Rath. Played in beautiful sunshine with a reasonable breeze both sides served up some excellent hurling with some great individual performances and some pure farce to boot.

Young Hamilton clears the ball

St. John's opened up their account on four minutes with a Barry McFall 35m free on the right after Eoghan Caldwell had been fouled. Two minutes later Caldwell burst through the Mount Rath defence on a powerful 45m solo run to glide over the Johnnies second score to further increase their lead.

Mount Rath's P. Carroll takes his shot

P. Carroll replied two minutes later for Mount Raths first point before a high cross from the right was doubled on by the sharp D. Nevin to volley spectacularly to the Johnnies net. McFall was then fouled in possession some two minutes later and he promptly converted from 40m on the right wing for the Antrim men.

St. Johns added further to their tally when the industrious Brian Holmes burst through a pack of Mount Rath defenders to slot over an excellent point. This was followed a minute later by another sharp point from McFall who burst diagonally across the field for 30m to point from 25m out.

The play had been end to end and Mount Raths Paul Rice replied with a superb 65m strike to pull the midlanders back into the game. But from the puck out Caldwell fed a long ball into the square where Sean Paul Wright latched onto the breaking ball to hit the net to give the Johnnies their first goal of the tour.

Tommy Shannon runs down the ball

Amazingly within a minute McFall again latched onto another breaking ball some 25m out to run across the front of the goals and blast to the corner of the net to give the Antrim men a 2:05 to 1:02 half-time lead.

Both sets of players await Barry McFall's 65'.

With a reasonable breeze advantage in the first half St. Johns certainly had enough possession in the last quarter to put a significant score on the board. But some stiff defending from Mount Rath's tight fullback line of G.Davy, Liam Byrne and K.Byrne kept the scoring to a minimum.

The St. John's defence likewise played an excellent game with Anthony Moore, Peter McGarrity , Marty Elliott and the exceptional Colm McCrudden playing really well.

We didn't have to wait long into the second half for the first score when Gary Brophy sneaked in behind the Johnnies defence to score a goal from 15m. Mount Rath with their backs up and playing with the wind advantage managed to pull another goal back some two minutes later when P.Carroll broke through the Antrim defence and scored a great goal from 15m to level the scores Mount Rath 3:02 , St. John's 2:05.

Mount Rath's Paul Rice plays the ball up the field

Barry McFall for the Johnnies managed to pull back another goal for St.Johns some two minutes later before McFall picked off three more points from frees.

St. John's Under 16's

This was replied to almost immediately by Mount Rath with C.Carroll driving in to score another goal for the Laois men to give St. John's a two point advantage of 3:07 to 4:02. With the excitement at fever pitch McFall pointed another 25m free on the left when Pat Gregory was fouled in possession before Paul Rice pointed a superb 70m free for the midlanders to leave a goal between the sides in St. John's favour.

Then two unbelievably controversial refereeing decisions which saw two 21 yard frees awarded to Mount Rath both with in a minute of each other.

These, unfortunately for the Antrim men, were expertly dispatched to the Johnnies net by Paul Brophy to give Mount Rath a three point lead of 6:03 to 3:09. But this story wasn't over yet when Sean Paul Wright latched onto another breaking ball some 15m out to crash to the net to give St. John's the draw they more than deserved.

Mount Rath Under 16's

Certainly the game itself was an enjoyable encounter with some excellent hurling from both sides. Gary Brophy, Paul Rice, D. Nevin, Sam Stevens and the two Carroll brothers hurled well for Mount Rath.

For St. Johns Barry McFall, Eoghan Caldwell, Colm McCrudden, Tomas Shannon, Peter McGarrity, Pat Gregory, Brian Holmes, Aodhan Mulholland, Marty Elliott and the ever improving Anthony Moore had good games for St. John's.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to Mount Rath G.A.C. and John Carroll in particular for facilitating both our U-16 & Senior Teams and hope we can lock horns again some day in the future.

Mount Rath: 1.Colm Lanham,2.G.Davy,3.Liam Byrne,4.K.Byrne, 5.G.Phelan.6.Sam Stevens,7.S.Lanham, 8.Gary Brophy,9.Paul Rice, 10.W.McInerney. 11.P.Carroll, 12.C.Carroll, 13.D.Dunne, 14.P.McCartney, 15.D.Nevin.

Manager: John Carroll

Mount Rath Scorers: Gary Brophy 3:00 (2:00 frees), P.Carroll 1:01, D.Nevin 1:00, C.Carroll 1:00, Paul Rice 0:02(0:01 free).

St. John's: 1.Ciaran McKissock,2.Sean McDaniel, 3.Colm McCrudden, 4.Marty Elliott, 5.Aodh Hamilton, 6 Peter McGarrity, 7. Anthony Moore, 8.Brian Holmes, 9.Tomas Shannon, 10.Eoghan Caldwell, 11.Barry McFall, 12.Aodhan Mulholland, 13. Pat Gregory, 14.Aaron McKenna, 15.Sean Paul Wright.

Substitutes: All Used: 16. Brendan O'Neill, 17.Declan McVeigh, 18.Michael Flannery

Manager: Shane Caldwell
Mentors: Michael O'Neill, Conor Gannon

St. John's Scorers: Barry McFall 2:07 (0:06 frees), Sean Paul Wright 2:00, Eoghan Caldwell 0:01, Brian Holmes 0:01

Referee: John Carroll