Errigal and Stewartstown advance in Junior Championship

Errigal Ciaran III 0-12 Brocagh 1-7

Errigal Ciaran Thirds came out on top in the Rock on Sunday but they were made to fight all the way for their Junior Championship Preliminary Round victory against a dogged Brocagh side.

The twin threat of Darren Canavan and man of the match, Davy Harte, was central to the Dunmoyle men’s victory, but they will be the first to heap praise on their teammates in what was a good all-round display from the winners. There is no doubt that the key moment in the contest arrived in the 23rd minute, when Brocagh had midfielder, Conan McDonald, black carded. Only the minimum divided the sides at that stage, but the resulting free was converted, and the winners went on to open up a four point lead by the short whistle.

Errigal Ciaran looked lively from the start, and a brilliant score from out on the left wing from Harte was followed by a quality effort from Canavan as well. Canavan then added a score from a free, and it took a quarter of an hour for Brocagh to trouble the umpires with a neat score from McDonald.

Hughes converted a fine free from a tricky angle, but, straight away, the winners responded with a splendid effort from distance from Connor McAleer.

Michael Carolan steered over a good score for Brocagh, before McDonald collected his black card; Canavan converting the resulting forty metre free. From there until the break, the winners made their numerical advantage count, as Pascal Donnelly hit a beauty from out on the right wing, and Canavan pointed from play to leave it 0-7 to 0-4 at the break.

With McDonald back in action for the second half, Brocagh began well with a Hughes free, before Aidan Dorman and Niall Cassidy combined for Campbell to blast the ball to the net from close range. Questions were now being asked of Errigal Ciaran, but their next three scores were of the highest order, with Harte getting two either side of one from Damian McDermott.

Canavan and Hughes exchanged points from frees, before a scuffle took place that resulted in yellow cards for Ciaran McNally and McDonald – and that resulted in a red for the latter.

Brocagh, though, kept asking questions of their opponents, and when two frees were won, up stepped Hughes to convert both.

Only the minimum separated the two sides now, with the contest in injury time, but, crucially, Canavan won a free, which he converted himself, and that saw his team into the first round proper.

Stewartstown 1-12 Donaghmore 0-2

THE opening game in this season’s LCC Junior Championship proved to be a damp squib in every sense of the word, as league champions, Stewartstown eased past Donaghmore Thirds in dreadful weather conditions at Rock last Sunday.

It was a contest that Championship favourites the Harps controlled from start-to-finish, and the fact that they created 39 scoring chances over the course of the 60-odd minutes tells its own story about their dominance.

The Harps opened the scoring inside the first minute, with a fine point from an acute angle from Shea O’Neill after being picked out with a brilliant precision pass from Macaulay Quinn.

Donaghmore drew level with a well- struck ‘45’ from Christopher Hughes, but that score in the third minute was their last of the half. The Harps dominated possession, and, no doubt, they could have been out of sights if they had their shooting boots with them. A 40-metre free from the boot of Dan Lowe gave Stewartstown a lead that they were never to lose, and while they struggled to break down the Donaghmore defensive structure, they always looked comfortable.

Man-of-the-match, Macaulay Quinn, then weighed in with his first point of the afternoon via the post, and Shea O’Neill added to that before wing half back, Stephen Talbot, drove forward to score via the bar. It was all Stewartstown, and a Dan Lowe free completed the first half scoring. Stewartstown picked up where they had left off on the restart, with midfielder, Quinn, splitting the posts again, before the hard-working Cathal Devlin got his name on the scoresheet. The Harps, then, carved open the Donaghmore defence, but Theo Lowe fisted the ball across the goalmouth, and there was nobody there to convert the chance.

Quinn landed an outstanding point from out on the right wing, before the superb Tiernan Rush and Theo Lowe combined for defender Conor Quinn to blast the ball into the top left-hand corner of the net.

Quinn, then, kicked his best point from outside the 45m line, before Donaghmore keeper, Hughes, came to his side’s rescue to deny Dylan McElhatton.

A free from Mark Nugent ended Donaghmore’s barren spell in the final minute, but it was a dominant Stewartstown side who had the final say through Gerard O’Neill.