Ballinabrackey rout Skryne
Ballinabrackey 1-24 Skryne 2-02
Premier Football Championship. Division 5 – Round 1.
Skryne had to travel to the Offaly border for their first round championship game against Ballinabrackey. Skryne like their Division 1 counterparts reached the final of this competition last time around and so would have been optimistic about their chances in this year’s competition. Skryne’s third team were missing almost half a dozen players from the team that lined out in that final and they faced Ballinabrackey’s very strong second string team who looked like they could cope quite well 2 divisions further up and based on this performance must be firm favourites to take the Division 5 title this year.
Skryne laboured badly in this game and some of the younger players looked short on fitness, while the older players like Allan Carty, Martin Mulvaney and James Looby were probably the best performers along with George Fitzpatrick who was impressive throughout. Ballinabrackey had seven points on the board before Skryne registered their opening score on the twenty first minute when Alex Grendon sent a fine pass into Aidan Gill who shot low past the Ballinabrackey keeper for a goal to Skryne. Any hopes that this would spark a revival for Skryne were dashed five minutes later when a lofted ball over the Skryne full back line found the Ballinabrackey midfielder unmarked in front of goal. The ball bounced up and he punched it to the net to restore Ballinabrackey’s seven point lead. They added four more points without a reply to leave Skryne eleven points adrift at half-time. Ballinabrackey 1-11, Skryne 1-0.
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Ballinabrackey opened the scoring in the second half with a point before Skryne substitute Felim O’Rourke added Skryne’s second score of the evening with a pointed free. Ballinabrackey added three more points before O’Rourke hit his second point of the game, this time from play just before the water break. Ballinabrackey 1-16, Skryne 1-2.
Ballinabrackey added a further six points without a reply before Bryan Clarke punched in Skryne’s second goal after Felim O’Rourke squared the ball across to him in front of the Ballinabrackey goal. Ballinabrackey had time to add two more points. The final whistle could not come fast enough for the battered and bruised Skryne team.
Skryne will be expecting a much improved performance next time out as they will hope to get things back on track after a very disappointing opening round performance.
Final score: Ballinabrackey 1-24, Skryne 2-2.
Skryne -Des McAvinney. Paddy O’Leary, Ciarán Finnerty, Jack Swan; Ronan McCabe, James Looby, Paul McGoldrick; Jack O’Donnell, Alex Grendon; George Fitzpatrick, Martin Mulvaney, Seán Keogh; Aidan Gill, Allan Carty, Michael Swan.
Subs: Felim O’Rourke, Alan Tuite, Shane McEnroy, Bryan Clarke
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