St. Martin’s hit near neighbours for six in Junior football rout

ST. MARTIN’S GLYNN-BARNTOWN 6-18 0-7

A DOMINANT St. Martin’s hit local rivals Glynn-Barntown for six in a one-sided Enniscorthy Farm Systems Junior football championship Group A match in a blustery Bree on Saturday.

The game was over as a contest at half-time, with the Piercestown and Murrintown men utilising the breeze to full effect in the opening period, building up an insurmountable 4-10 to 0-4 advantage by the break.

Impressively they went on to add another 2-8 to their tally playing into the elements, while Glynn-Barntown huffed and puffed but didn’t have the ammunition to blow the last line of the defence down.

The first St. Martin’s goal arrived on 13 minutes when Kyle Firman collected a Ryan Murphy pass and his shot from a tight angle dropped under the crossbar, out of the reach of goalkeeper Adam O’Leary, to give them a 1-3 to 0-1 advantage.

After the hard-working Richard Devereux tagged on his third point he then turned provider in the 16th minute, knocking the ball into the path of Ryan Murphy who blasted it to the back of the net.

Glynn-Barntown briefly threatened to rally with three points on the trot midway through the half, with Gary Delaney knocking over two frees and Dylan Lyne adding their first point from play.

However, St. Martin’s turned the screw again and had the green flag waving twice more before the change of ends.

With 23 minutes on the clock Eoghan Rackard applied a cool finish after good work in the buildup from Jack Devereux and Philip Waters, and three minutes later they had their fourth major.

Ryan Murphy gathered possession and burst forward through a Glynn-Barntown defence that parted like the Red Sea, before planting a shot beyond O’Leary.

Glynn-Barntown needed a bright start to the second-half if they were to salvage any sort of pride from the derby, but it was St. Martin’s who were celebrating another goal inside a minute of the resumption.

Philip Waters picked out the run of Jack Devereux and he did the rest, calmly side-footing the ball to the corner of the net.

Glynn-Barntown kept plugging away and sent imposing midfielder Gary Delaney to the edge of the square in the hope of plundering a goal or two, but although he did force one decent save out of Ben Cohen, the St. Martin’s defence held firm.

Creating goal chances came much easier at the other end though and Eoghan Rackard had the final say on 59 minutes when he linked up with Richard Devereux, before arrowing the ball to the net.

On this form, St. Martin’s will be very hard to beat at a later stage.

St. Martin’s: Brad Cohen; Pádraig Rossiter, Kevin Price, Philip Dempsey; Adam Cantwell, Luke White, Kyle Firman (1-1); Conor Coleman (0-1 free), Peter Barry (0-1); Diarmuid Byrne (0-1), Richard Devereux (0-5), Jack Devereux (1-4); Eoghan Rackard (20), Philip Waters, Ryan Murphy (2-2). Subs. - Adrian Ryan (0-1) for Waters, Darragh Rossiter (0-1) for Murphy.

Glynn-Barntown: Adam O’Leary; Ger Dempsey, Paschal Carley, David Roche; Ciarán Joyce, Shane Codd, Kevin Crean; Gary Delaney (0-4, 3 frees), Aaron Breen; Matthew Joyce, Seán Carmody (0-1), Bill Joyce; Daniel O’Regan, Dylan Lyne (0-1), Jack Brazzill. Subs. - Pierce Donoghue (0-1) for Roche, John Leacy for O’Regan, P.J. Carley for Paschal Carley, Shane Carley for B. Joyce, Barry Kirwan for Breen, Paschal Carley for Delaney.

Referee: Martin Armstrong (Starlights).