Clogher ‘up and running’ against Ballymena

CLOGHER Valley got their season off to a positive start on Saturday when they recorded a 35-14 victory over Ballymena in the Ulster Senior Cup at The Cran.

Tries from Aaron Crawford, Callum Smyton, Alex Howe, Taine Haire and Jake Woods, along with four David Maxwell conversions and one from Paul Armstrong ensured Stephen Bothwell’s men enjoyed a less taxing day at the office than anticipated, and the head coach was pleased with that aspect of the encounter.

“We didn’t need it to be a real tester today,” he observed. “It’s obviously our first day and we played different boys – two different sets of half-backs in the first half, and in the second half, we also made changes; a young boy from the 18s came in at centre for a wee while, so we’re delighted.

“Of course, there are loads of things to work on but delighted where we ended up.”

Bothwell was also pleased with his side’s overall performance and game management, even at this early stage of the season.

“We played sensibly in the first half,” he acknowledged. “There was a wee wind advantage and we put the ball on them, put pressure on them, got mistakes out of them and scored.

“We were 21 points up in about 20 minutes but they scored twice from our mistakes and we ended up on their line for the last 10 minutes [of the first half] but weren’t clinical enough.

“In the second half we scored a nice try with some nice, clinical rugby and they only got into our half once, so I’m delighted.”

Bothwell knows much tougher tasks lie ahead with two away ties in the competition lying in wait at City of Armagh and then Instonians before the All-Ireland Leagues get underway at the end of September.

“We just need to get a wee bit of confidence [ahead of the next two games], try to get boys to training to try to go through more things,” he said.

“I think we kept everyone on their feet. We’re up and running.”