Omagh Accies kick off with a narrow victory

OMAGH Accies picked where they left off last season by defeating Ballymena 26-25 in their opening Ulster Premiership game on Saturday.

Glenn Kyle’s men won two of their last three games last year to maintain their All Ireland senior status and if Saturday’s performance is anything to go by, hopes will by high around Thomas Mellon Park for a much more comfortable campaign this time around.

“It’s a good start to the season,” beamed last year’s captain, Ryan Mitchell, who was pleased with the performances of the younger squad members, including scrum-half Sam Beattie and Conor Huey.

He added: “We produced a lot of what we’ve been trying to do in training and we got 80 minutes into the tank, which will help [later in the season].

“A lot of guys got game time, we had a very young team out and several of those young guys did well and put their names forward [for inclusion throughout the season].

“Today we wanted a focused performance and we did that and then the result worked out from that. But early doors, you don’t know where teams are sitting, it’s about trying guys out so it was good to get the win and the performance too.”

Tries from Josh Kyle, who formed a solid centre partnership with Kiwi back Conor Spencer, second XV captain Mark Smyth and two from Ryan Mitchell, as well as three conversions from Scott Elliott, secured the win for Omagh on the day, although they did have to battle back from an early deficit.

Ballymena started the brighter of the sides and they led through a Daniel Vercde-Rogers try converted by Tristan Ferguson but the Accies responded to level matters before two Pierce Crowe penalties put the visitors back in front.

Again, though, Omagh bounced back with a second converted try to lead at the interval and they extended their advantage to eight points with a third converted try five minutes after the restart.

A try and a conversion from Pierce Crowe brought it back to a one point game but another Accies try five minutes from time seemed to have sealed the deal for the hosts. But in the final minute, Vercde-Rogers dotted down again to keep things interesting over the closing seconds before the final whistle blew for an Omagh win.

“We played some good stuff first half,” Mitchell observed.

“We gave away an early score, but we built our way into the game and we scored some good tries, some good transition, turnover tries. It was good.”

This coming Saturday, Omagh travel to Belfast Harlequins, who beat Clogher Valley 29-27 at the weekend, before they visit their near neighbours at The Cran on September 7 for their final pre-All-Ireland League fixture of the Ulster Premiership season.

“Harlequins will be up for it but it will be another good test and another good opportunity to get more minutes in the legs,” Mitchell added.