Accies seconds aiming to end 10 years of hurt at Kingspan

OMAGH Accies seconds are aiming to end a decade-long cup drought on Saturday afternoon when they travel to Kingspan Stadium where they will lock horns with Donaghadee in the Gordon West decider.

The twos last tasted victory in a cup final in 2015 when they won the Crawford Cup by outscoring Ballynahinch thirds by eight tries to one to seal a 52-14 success and team manager, James Kane admits it’s ‘shocking’ that they haven’t experienced that feeling since.

But after seeing his side edge out Inishowen and Virginia before they saw off their Dungannon counterparts by 10 points in the last four, they will be back at Ulster Rugby HQ once more, which they are all looking forward to.

“It’s a day out at Ravenhill, which we haven’t had for ten years,” he acknowledged. “It’s shocking to think that it’s been that long since the Crawford Cup final.”

The only member of that 2015 team still playing for the seconds, Dean Porter, won’t be available on Saturday due to injury and captain Mark Smyth’s wedding, and while he is also faced with a couple of other injuries, Kane is happy with his lot ahead of the showpiece.

“Young Paul Millar came in at the start of the season but unfortunately broke his ankle before Christmas; Ryan Armstrong was out for two seasons but got a wrist injury, but there’s loads of strength and depth in the squad, he observed.

“I’s just unfortunate with Mark getting married and a few boys being injured, we could be stronger. But I’m very happy with the squad we have because we’ve really gelled a team together, and a lot of that is down to Andrew Johnston at 10 and Jake Reid at 15.”

And Kane feels a win over Donaghadee on Saturday would be just reward for his squad, who have undergone something of a rebuild in recent seasons after a tough couple of years playing up a level.

But he admits, he won’t be taking anything for granted, even after watching ‘Dee getting thumped 60-7 in a league clash at Strabane over the weekend.

“The boys went through a tough few years playing at that 2nd XV AIL level, coming up against monstrous teams week in and week out for four or five seasons,” Kane added.

“There were a lot of guys stepped away from rugby in their late 20s/early 30s and the team that was playing, it was too high a standard for them, so we brought them back down into Provincial 1, stepping down a league voluntarily.

“The boys are more competitive, they have a bit of confidence in themselves. It’s still a very tough league, you have Dungannon seconds and other second AIL teams in it.

“And like Armagh III proved the other week when they beat us in the semi-final of the Crawford Cup, you just can’t take anything for granted.

“I went down to watch the game and Strabane were hurting massively not to be at the final after Donaghadee put them out in the semi-final. They had a bit of an axe to grind and I’d assume Donaghadee rested half a dozen players with the final in mind, but Strabane played an absolutely excellent game of rugby on Saturday, a faultless game of rugby and fair play to them.”