Omagh Academy lads set to hit the road again

OMAGH Academy’s rugby first XV are probably starting to feel a little like Willie Nelson as they prepare to get back ‘on the road again’ tomorrow (Saturday) morning.

They had to travel to Grosvenor in round three of the Danske Bank Schools’ Cup where they achieved an emphatic victory and then they were assigned a tough task at RBAI in round four.

After a 38-15 reverse in Belfast, Ross Hunter had hoped for some home comforts in the last-eight of the Subsidiary Shield, but they have had no such luck and instead face the longest journey they could at Down High School this coming Saturday.

“It’s lovely, isn’t it?,” sighed a frustrated Hunter, who is looking forward to the challenge of tackling Down again this coming weekend after watching his team beating them in Lisburn earlier in the season.

However, such was the narrow margin of that victory and with the County Down side playing at their actual home venue rather than a neutral ground, Hunter knows a tough task lies in wait.

“If you look at the teams who are in that Subsidiary Shield, there are no easy games,” he acknowledged.

“Home advantage is an advantage and we have to go there and overcome that but if we play to the best of our ability then our boys should have the confidence to go on and win the game.”

The Academy lads certainly impressed last time out at RBAI in round four of the Cup proper and while that game ended in a 17-point defeat, Hunter believes his side were never that far away from their more illustrious opponents.

“I don’t think the 38-15 scoreline reflected the game,” he observed. “They took an early lead and we came back into it well. It was 10-all for quite a long period in the first half, up until the 25th minute and then Inst got another score.

“So it was 17-10 in the run up to half-time and we were trying to push on to see if we could get another score on the scoreboard. We were actually camped on their try line for three or four minutes on the cusp of half-time and gave away a bit of a fortuitous penalty and basically two lineouts later they are under the sticks.

“That was demoralising and then they come out and score an early try in the second half so it was effectively game over.

“We stuck at it, never ever gave up but my personal feeling is had we scored that try in the run up to half-time and had been 17-15 or 17-17 or even if we had just held them out to 17-10, then I think the second half could have been an interesting affair. But it didn’t work out that way.”