By 
OMAGH Accies moved up to fourth in the Ulster Championship 1 table after earning a second successive bonus point win, this time thumping Cooke 50-19 at Shaw’s Bridge in Belfast.
Buoyed by back-to-back victories over Portadown in the Towns Cup and the league, Omagh entered Saturday’s clash with confidence and it showed as they took an early lead through a Ryan Mitchell try.
Cooke, however, weren’t about to roll over and have their tummies tickled and an entertaining opening continued with the home side going 7-5 in front with a converted try and they went 14-10 up after Atino Toeoaana had dotted down for the Accies.
That was as good as it was to get for the Belfast outfit, however, as Omagh took control from that point on, regaining the lead thanks to two Reece Braden tries before the break, which they reached with a 22-14 advantage.
Accies captain Matthew Clyde, Mitchell, Matthew Eccles and Scott Ballantine all added further tries in the second half as Omagh reached a half century of points against a Cooke side who finished with a consolation score at the death.
“The boys played well. It was nice to get a good win away from home,” Clyde beamed. “We’re just trying to build momentum every week. We’ve had two wins over Portadown and now this against Cooke, so we’ll continue building momentum and improving every week.”
Another good performance will be needed by Omagh this coming Saturday when they travel to Eaton Park to take on Ballymena seconds in the quarter-finals of the Towns Cup.
Having reached the last four of the Junior Cup earlier this season, Clyde admits another cup run would be nice. “It would be great to get a cup run going again. It won’t be easy going away to Ballymena, but hopefully we can take a bit of confidence away from the last few weeks and back it up again.”
