One point win for big ballers

Monageer-Boolavogue 2-06 v 2-07 Blackwater

A one point win in extremely windy conditions in Monageer on Saturday afternoon for our Junior footballers. The lads had a large panel to choose from and started with a very young team for the first day out.

We played with the strong wind in the first period but it was Monageer who started the better for the first 15 minutes, Conor Sutton, who was brilliant on the frees considering the difficulty, did open the scoring for us with 5 gone but three minutes later Monageer had the ball in the net after a free flowing move. We nearly goaled ourselves shortly after when Mossy Murphys goal shot was well stopped by the Monageer goalie. They tagged on two more points with 15 still left in the half and things were looking grim. But our lads started to up the pace and a Conor free followed by a excellent tight angled score by Dean Wright had us back to just 2 points behind. On 20 minutes, a move started by Kevin O’Brien was worked a one two with Arron and then Adam Murphy, laid it off to Conor Sutton who still had a bit of work to do but he managed to finish well low to the net. Another excellent Conor Sutton free and then a Pad point from distance had us motoring well. A mossy point just before the break had 4 points in it but our lads were facing a gale going into the next 30.

Monageer started quickly to eat into the 4 point lead and they pointed with just three minutes gone. With 7 gone, they moved ahead with a goal and again our lads had to work hard to bring the ball up the field. Like so many other years, we seem to play better against the wind, and we worked the ball out wide to Mossy, who still had a bit of work to do, dummying the goalie and kicking low to the net. What followed was 15 minutes of attrition with a brilliant defensive effort with Robbie McGuinness and Ennae Carroll in brilliant form. A Conor Sutton free had us 2 ahead with 10 left on the clock but Monageer had it back to 1 again with still 6 minutes left. They had two late free chances to level the game but the shots drifted wide to leave us off to a winning start in the league,