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FIRST half tries from South African duo, Ruan de Beer and Christiaan Grobler earned Strabane a vital 15-7 home win over their Ulster Championship 3 title rivals, Coleraine, at Bradley Way on Saturday.
In front of a bumper festive crowd, Strabane achieved the minimum result they needed by picking up four points and leaving Coleraine empty-handed, in order for their title and promotion aspirations to remain alive and well into the new year.
“It’s the best result other than getting five points [with a try scoring bonus point],” Strabane head coach, Neville Magee observed.
“We were 15-0 at half-time and while we left a few scores out there, the coach is happy but not content because we didn’t score any points second half.
“But the boys showed heart and dedication and they put in the tackles, they were working hard for each other. It was a real good performance in a way. There’s some basic stuff to fix but certainly to get the win was good. Four points was what we wanted.”
After starting the season like a proverbial runaway train when they recorded six bonus point league wins on the bounce as well as earning a place in the Gordon West Cup semi-finals, their momentum had halted somewhat in recent weeks.
They fell to a narrow home loss to another of the promotion favourites, Virginia, two weeks before they were felled in Coleraine, but after both, Strabane head coach, Neville Magee, remained steadfast in his belief that both results were nothing more than blips.
And he will now be hoping that Saturday’s return to form, which will not only boost his players’ confidence during the Christmas break, but will also provide some much-needed festive cheer, is a sign of things to come, especially with a hectic start to 2026 ahead of them.
Strabane will travel to Donaghadee in the league on January 3rd before taking on Coleraine in the last four of the Gordon West Cup on the 10th before visiting Virginia on the 17th. They will then take on Donaghadee at home in the league on the 24th before making it six games in as a many weeks with trips to Cavan and Holywood.
And Magee feels Saturday’s triumph will make preparing for those much easier.
“It was a very important game [to maintain positivity over Christmas],” he acknowledged. “Everyone is happy with the win and we’ll be building on it over the Christmas period as well when we have some training sessions to do. The guys are all keen to stay on the horse, to get out, got the the gym and get onto the pitch, so we’ll do a bit of work because we have six games in a row from January 3rd.”
