Clogher reign at the ‘Palace’

CLOGHER Valley followed up their opening day victory over Ballymena with an equally emphatic win at City of Armagh in their second Ulster Senior Cup Group B clash of the season on Saturday when they secured a 43-24 victory at the Palace Grounds.

Having defeated the Braidmen 33-15 a week earlier, Clogher went into their clash with Armagh, who are two divisions above them in the All-Ireland League system, quietly confident of getting a positive result, but not expecting what transpired.

And while head coach, Stephen Bothwell was delighted to see his side romp to a high scoring win courtesy of tries from Luke Allen, David Maxwell, who added a penalty and three conversions, Matthew Bothwell, Taine Haire (2), Karl Bothwell and Thomas Barnett, he’s not getting carried away by the result given their hosts weren’t at full strength on the day.

However, given Armagh had around 11 regular starters in their ranks means Bothwell can still take plenty of positives ahead of the encounter, but he knows a tougher task lies ahead this coming weekend at Instonians.

“I never dreamt it was going to happen. Coming down here, you expect both teams [Clogher seconds also won at the Palace Grounds, 33-22 on Saturday] to be coming away with our tails between our legs,” Bothwell said.

“There were parts of our game were sharp, [attacking round the corner] was excellent.”

“They wouldn’t have been close [to full strength]. I’m sure there would have been 11 who played 1A last year, but there were loads of boys you’d see on the [team] sheet a lot of times.

“It’s a good result, but we know we played tougher teams than that in the AIL, and I’d say next week we’ll get our clipping!”