Moynalty survive Mary's scare
Moynalty 0-8
St Mary’s 0-6
The final scoreline in the JBFC semi-final between Moynalty and St Mary’s suggests that this was a dullish affair, however, a titanic battle in midfield, an unbelievable goalkeeper save, a feeling that an upset was on the cards and a Moynalty physio dressed to the nines all contributed in making this quite an entertaining encounter for the neutral.
Moynalty came into this encounter priced up as 1/20 favourites. Although no one gave the resilient St Mary’s a copy of the script and the Donore side came very close to pulling off the shock of the weekend and maybe the entire championship.
St Mary’s went in at halftime one-point to the good and it was only in the third quarter that Moynalty managed to get on top of their opponents. The men in red and white rattled off the first four points of the second-half without response and in this low-scoring encounter that proved to be good enough to secure the Newgrange outfit a spot in the JBFC final.
Sam Victory who had a fine game at midfield for St Mary’s got proceedings underway before Joey Gilsenan responded with a free to level the scores early on. A brilliantly claimed mark was taken quickly by James Cassidy to Dylan Farrelly who finished off the nice move and sent Moynalty ahead by one.
St Mary's responded well by kicking two points in quick succession, one for each of their corner forwards, James Lynch and Ben Loughran. For the next ten minutes, Moynalty went through a bit of barron period hitting three bad wides in a row. Eventually, Ollie Sheridan settled the ship with a well-struck free.
Moynalty were reduced temporarily to 14 men when their captain Paddy Byrne was shown a black card for a deliberate trip with eight minutes left in the half. A Cormac Victory free sent St Mary's in at halftime holding a one-point advantage.
Moynalty came out all guns blazing in the second half and St Mary’s keeper Adam Byrne was called into action early to deny Dylan Farrelly a fantastic goal-scoring opportunity. A few minutes later Niall O’Connor laid the ball off to Jude Gilsenan who kicked a fantastic point from distance to level the contest at 0-4 apiece.
After Cormac Victory missed what looked like a straightforward free, Moynalty went on the offence but were lucky to be awarded a free of their own when Cormac’s brother Sam appeared to dispossess Niall O’Connor fairly and brilliantly only to be penalised. Joey Gilsenan took advantage and knocked over his second to put Moynalty a point to the good.
A few moments later two points in quick succession courtesy of Paddy Byrne and James Cassidy gave Moynalty a three-point advantage. Adam Byrne came to St Mary’s rescue once more when he pulled off a wonder save to deny Kian Lynch.
Some lovely link-up play between Loughran and Cormac Victory gave Adam Craven to opportunity to reduce the gap back to two with three minutes left on the clock. However, some silly errors from St Mary’s eventually led to Moynalty netminder Johnny Lynch being able to strike a free over from distance and restore Moynalty’s three-point cushion.
A late point from Tadgh Dixon gave St Mary’s some hope but they failed to score again and Moynalty hung on to see themselves through to the JBFC finale.
Moynalty - Johnny Lynch (0-1, one free); Cormac Kearney, Liam Brogan, Joey Gilsenan (0-2, two frees); Richie Gilsenan, Adam Reilly, Jude Gilsenan (0-1); Niall O’Connor, Ollie Sheridan (0-1); James Cassidy (0-1), Paddy Byrne (0-1, one free), John Brogan; Ronan Lynch, Paul Lynch, Dylan Farrelly (0-1). Subs – Bryan McCormack for P Lynch 24m, Anto Nevin for Ollie Sheridan halftime, Kian Lynch for J Gilsenan 38m.
St Mary’s – Adam Byrne; Liam Lynch, Conor O’Brien, John Spain; Adam Craven (0-1), Dylan Bagnall, AJ Bradshaw; Sam Victory (0-1), Joey Greene; Cormac Victory (0-1, one free), Tadgh Dixon (0-1), Cathal Sheridan; James Lynan (0-1, one free), Sean Nulty, Ben Loughran (0-1). Subs – Matthew Brien for Lynan, Liam O’Brien for Dixon both 50m, William McSweeney for S Victory 53m, Tadgh Dixon for Nulty 58m.
Referee – Peter Skelly