Tyrone hurlers suffer narrow loss to Wicklow

Wicklow 0-15     Tyrone  0-12

TYRONE hurlers were just a puck of a sliothar away from sharing the league points with Wicklow in this Division 2B game at Echelon Park, Aughrim on Sunday.

Yet they and Wicklow, with two points from two games, are still in the race to secure promotion.

Tyrone secured promotion from the Nicky Rackard in 2022, then trounced London last week 1-26 to 1-18; and not surprisingly they brought their A game to Aughrim yesterday.

In a low scoring first half, Wicklow edged themselves in front by the 10 minute mark, on their way to a 0-7 to 0-5 lead at the break.

Twice early on Tyrone drew level as winger CJ McGourty and full-forward Lorcan Devlin negated a brace of Wicklow points by Diarmuid Masterson who hit the ground running with a pair of beauties.

Defences on both sides tended to hold the upper-hand with Cris Kearns, Ruairi Devlin and Oran McKee catching the eye for Tyrone.

As against Meath a week ago, Wicklow had another poor start to the second half, whereas Tyrone came out with guns blazing.

Inside six minutes they had erased the deficit with points by CJ McGourty and Michael Little from a free. It was 0-7 each and all to play for.

Michael Little was on fire with his frees, finishing with an impressive total of 0-7, one of them a 65.

Tyrone were rampant at this stage and Little split the Wicklow posts again. Tyrone edged in front.

At this stage Wicklow looked as if the were going to suffer the same fate as they did against Meath.

In the 53rd minute Diarmuid Masterson steadied the Wicklow ship with levelling point.

Little responded to put Tyrone’s nose in front again. Luke Evans and Padraig O’Toole hit back for Wicklow.

Wicklow went ahead 0-11 to 0-9. It was hectic, nail biting and Little kept shooting the points for Tyrone. The sides were again deadlocked at 0-12 each as the clock approached full time.

Sub Seanie Germaine and Diarmuid Masterson (2) came to the rescue for Wicklow with the three winners.

Tyrone were awarded a free in front of the Wicklow posts in the dying moments. Michael Little tried to blast an equalising goal but the shot was saved.

THE SCORERS

Wicklow
Diarmuid Masterson 0-6, L Evans 0-2, C Moorehouse 0-2, G Weir, A O’Brien, S Germaine, P O’Toole P Doyle 0-1 each.
Tyrone
M Little 0-7 (6f,65), L Devlin 0-2, CJ McGrourty 0-2, S Duffin 0-1.