Dromara Prove Too Strong
Date Filed: 03 May 2017
Aghaderg senior footballers welcomed Dromara to Ballyvarley on Thursday evening. The management team of Mark O'Kane and Willie Fitzpatrick made three changes to the starting fifteen which had defeated Bright in last week's match. Keelin Doyle and Stevie Comiskey were unavailable and were replaced by James McGrath and Michael McGrath while Kieran Davis got his first start of the season in place of Conor McGivern.
The game started off at a fast pace with the visitors seeing more of the ball and their direct style of football seen them score two early points before C McAvoy from a free opened the red's scoring after three minutes. The match was hotly contested with C McAvoy adding two more frees after J McGrath and L Murray were fouled. Dromara kept a point in front and then scored the first goal of the evening after a rather sloppy clearance by an Aghaderg defender. The game remained competitive with the midfield battle between P McGrath, L Murray and the strong Dromara pair providing some fine catching and a total of seven marks in the first half. R McShane, C McAvoy and J McGrath were working hard in the forward line but were finding scores hard to come by. J McGrath fielded well from a long free from P McGrath and blasted the ball inches over the bar. Dromara got their second goal after another turn over in defence and in spite of a brilliant save from P Colgan. The rebound bounced favourably to an inrushing forward who finished to the net. C McAvoy completed Aghaderg's first half scoring after good work by R McShane and J McGrath. The visitors completed the first half with three points in the final three minutes.
Half Time: Aghaderg 0-6 Dromara 2 - 10
The second half continued to provide good entertainment for both sets of supporters. R O'Neill replaced M McGrath and won a lot of early ball but was narrowly wide on two occasions in the first ten minutes. C McAvoy scored an excellent point from play and one from a free after P McGrath was fouled but Dromara continued to keep the scoreboard ticking over with a number of points. In the final ten minutes C McShane replaced C Connolly, M Lennon replaced J McGrath and R Conway replaced G Donaghy. M Lennon and A McAvoy scored Aghaderg's final two points.
Overall a disappointing result but there were a number of fine individual performances from P Colgan in goal, the full back line with T Lennon most prominent. A McAvoy had another fine game acting as sweeper and set up a number of attacks. The mid field duo of P McGrath and L Murray won a lot of primary ball and worked tirelessly throughout. C McAvoy had another outstanding game and got most support from R McShane and J McGrath. The team as a whole worked hard throughout and are still coming to terms with the short passing counter attacking strategy they are attempting to employ. It has worked well in each game to date but against the stronger teams they have been unable to maintain the momentum for long enough periods. A work in progress. With their strongest team available the reds should be looking forward to the rest of the league campaign.
Team: Paul Colgan Ryan Strain Thomas Lennon Ciaran Connolly(Kieran McShane) Graeme Donaghy (Ruari Conway) Gerard Rice (0-1)Christopher Lennon Paul McGrath Louis Murray(1-0) Conor McGivern(0-1)( , Ruari Conway)James McGrath (Michael Lennon) Rory Mcshane (0-2) Christopher McAvoy-Capt(0-4), Aaron McAvoy(0-1). Subs: Kieran McShane, Michael Lennon, Steve McCann, Ruari O'Neill.