Tyrone Under-16s beat Mayo to land Buncrana Cup

BUNCRANA CUP FINAL

Tyrone 1-21 Mayo  2-13

ANOTHER memorable weekend for Tyrone underage football – you could say it’s something of a trend.

We’ll get to Saturday’s Buncrana Cup win in a moment, but it’s also worth recording that two fine Tyrone U15 teams got their hands on silverware in Derrylaughan in the Brian McLernon finals, the annual tournament that honours one of the club’s greatest ever stalwarts.

On the same afternoon, Tyrone’s U16 academy squad were in action in the Buncrana Cup final in, yes, no prizes for guessing, Buncrana.

For the uninitiated, the Buncrana Cup was established to commemorate the victims of the Omagh Bombing, a tragedy which had a devastating impact on the community of Buncrana.

That day – and the date of August 15, 1998 is all firmly ingrained in our collective consciousness – a group of children from the Donegal town traveled to the Ulster American Folk Park in Omagh on a bus with Spanish language exchange students.

On the way home, they made the fateful decision to stop off in Omagh, and three Buncrana youngsters and two Spanish Exchange students were killed in the atrocity.

Saturday marked the 25th anniversary of the tournament, and a plaque was unveiled at the club by Ulster GAA President Michael Geoghegan alongside family members and friends of the victims of the bombing.

So while there was a bigger picture to proceedings on a pleasantly sunny day at the host club, there was still a trophy to be won and a talented young group of Tyrone footballers were full value for their five-point win over their Mayo opponents.

Calling upon a number of lads who played prominent roles in the county’s recent surge to All-Ireland minor honours, including Ciaran McCrystal and Matthew F Daly, who both had excellent games on Saturday, it’s perhaps no surprise that Tyrone prevailed, though to be fair Mayo had their moments.

Indeed, the Connacht lads led 1-1 to no score after seven minutes following a Nathan Dooley goal, though Conan Canavan looked extremely lively up front for Tyrone and boomed over a two-pointer to get the show on the road.

The Red Hands were starting to boss matters in the middle sector with Ruairi O’Neill, Charlie Meenan and Tomas Gallen exerting considerable influence, and with the wind at their backs, it was evident that two-pointers were a priority, O’Neill firing over from distance midway through the half.

Tyrone’s running game was also giving Mayo plenty of headaches with Matthew F Daly and Logan O’Connor finding the target after lung-bursting incursions, though Mayo were faring reasonably well down the other end and it was 1-4 to 0-7 apiece with 20 minutes on the clock.

Canavan was unerring from the dead ball and nailed back-to-back ‘45s’ with plenty to spare before a late scoring burst from the Red Hands opened up a 0-12 to 1-5 lead at the interval, Daly, O’Neill and Daly again on target with a succession of impressive scores from play.

Mayo clawed their way back into proceedings early in the second-half; Conor Hoban making no mistake from the penalty spot a minute after the result, after which Thomas McWilliams split the posts, but Tyrone weren’t deterred from the task at hand.

A period of sustained yielded points from that man Matthew F Daly, sub Brian Óg McGuckin, Conan Canavan and a well-taken goal from Tomas Gallen after an assist from his equally influential colleague in the half-back line, Aodhan Corry.

Yet another score from Daly left it 1-18 to 2-6 heading into the final quarter, and you’d have been forgiven for thinking that the game was as good as over.

Mayo sub Evan Heneghan landed a two-point free before Tyrone full-back Sean Donnelly ghosted forward for a crowd-pleasing effort, but it wasn’t quite a done deal as the Connacht side went for broke in the final minutes.

Three late scores, including a two-pointer, set up a nervy finale but Tyrone had the final say when Canavan kept his cool in injury time as he guided over a superb two-point free from distance to set the seal on a well-deserved victory.

Scorers

Tyrone: Conan Canavan (0-8, 2 45s, 1 2pt, 1 2pt f), Matthew F Daly (0-6, 1 2pt), Ruairi O’Neill (0-3, 1 2pt), Tomas Gallen (1-0), Logan O’Connor, Brian Óg McGuckin, Shea O’Donnell and Sean Donnelly (0-1 each).

Mayo: Conor Hoban (1-6, 1 2pt, 1f), Thomas McWilliams (0-4), Nathan Dooley (1-0), Evan Heneghan (0-2, 1 2pt), Conan Reilly (0-1).

Teams

Tyrone: Jamie Kelly, Eoin Kelly, Sean Donnelly, Flynn Neeson, Ciaran McCrystal, Tomas Gallen, Aodhan Corry, Ruairi O’Neill, Charlie Meenan, Logan O’Connor, Odhran Barrett, Matthew F Daly, Conan Canavan, Shea O’Donnell, Conor Taggart. Subs used: Brian Óg McGuckin, Matthew C Daly, Vincent Gormley, Eoin Spence, Tiarnan McCarron.

Mayo: AJ Gormley Walsh, Eoin Jennings, Eanna O Boyle, Harry Dooney, Tadhg Kearney, Sean Brehony, Oisin Sweeney, Darragh Connor, John Jennings, Fiacra O Cinnseala, Conor Hoban, Adam Burton, Thomas McWilliams, Danny Brehony, Nathan Dooley. Subs used: Conan Reilly, Alexander Smith, Evan Heneghan.