Gannon keep pressure on league leaders with win over Malone

DUNGANNON ensured they kept pressure on Energia All-Ireland League 2B leaders Wanderers by beating Malone 17-15 in Belfast on Saturday.

Jonny Gillespie’s men found the going tough, however, against a Malone side who had started to find form after a difficult early part of the campaign and despite being their own worst enemies at times, with two yellow cards almost costing them dearly, they came through a tough clash on the right side of the scoreline to remain second in the table and on the tails of Wanderers who won over another of the promotion chasing sides, Skerries, on Saturday.

On a heavy pitch due to the thaw following last week’s cold snap, it was Malone who found their feet first as Matty Smyth knocked over a 35th minute penalty to give the home side a slender first half advantage.

The game really came to life in the second half, however, with Ben McCaughey kicking an equaliser for Dungannon before Sean O’Hagan saw yellow on 45 minutes. During his time in the sin-bin, Malone scored a try as Alfie Thomas dotted down to give the home side a five point advantage.

But once back to numerical parity, Dungannon responded with Ben McCaughey converting tries scored by Sam Montgomery and James Gamble as the visitors engineered an 8-17 advantage.

But once again, ill-discipline cost the Stevenson Park side and when David Leyburn was yellow carded with four minutes remaining, Malone sensed their opportunity and they closed the gap to just two points when Smyth converted a Dan Kerr score, but the home side were unable to deny Dungannon victory in the end, much to Gillespie’s delight and relief.

“Discipline was poor. Some of it came from the pressure we were under and some of it was down to us being ill-disciplined generally,” Gillespie observed. “But we found a way to get the job done, which was important.

“[Malone] win more than they lose up here and they could potentially win all their remaining games up here, I’ve no doubt about that.

“Their pack’s robust, abrasive and clever and we didn’t train on pitch all week due to the weather so we were coming in under-prepped and to be honest the performance looked like that. The pitch was sticky and heavy, which probably didn’t suit us to be honest and on any other day we could have lost that, so to find a way to come away with four points is hugely valuable.”

Dungannon entertain third placed UL Bohemians this coming Saturday before they face a tough trip to Galwegians and Gillespie is confident his players can succeed in both fixtures.

“UL will be tough, but it’s one we’ll go after and obviously we’ll have to go to Galway, which is a trip we have traditionally struggled with, so we’ll have to get as many points in the interim,” he added.

“But we spoke before Christmas about going to win in a few really tough places like Ballyclare and here [Malone] and wanting to try and win both and everyone was champing at the bit to do that and in fairness the boys had no excuses today [Saturday], they didn’t complain about not training, they just knuckled down and got on with it and they probably just about deserved it.”