Late rally can’t save brave Wanderers
Wexford bow out of Towns Cup
DUNDALK RFC WEXFORD WNDRS
THE final whistle couldn’t come soon enough for Dundalk as they held off a spirited late Wexford rally to book their place in the Bank of Ireland Provincial Towns Cup quarter-finals on Sunday afternoon.
With the benefit of home advantage, Dundalk were warm favourites to advance to the last eight, but they struggled to put their Division 2A opponents away and with better decision-making in the opposition 22 the Wanderers might have pulled off a big upset against the 2011 champions.
Wexford had the benefit of kicking down the slope and with the stiff and bitter wind slightly at their backs in the first half, and from the start they had their hosts on the back foot, winning a scrum penalty against the highly regarded home pack.
However, a second penalty for a lineout infringement was wasted as out half Sean Stafford missed touch as he attempted to kick for the corner and Sam Weber cleared brilliantly from the resulting 22 drop-out, finding touch in opposition territory.
Number 8 Tiernan Gonnelly’s powerful running briefly took Dundalk into the Wexford 22, but they were then penalised for not releasing and Stafford’s boot sent them deep into their own half once more.
Wexford hooker Graham Grant tried to engineer a scoring chance by taking a return pass from a short lineout, but he was bundled into touch and from Sean Arrowsmith’s throw Dundalk scrum half Daragh Conroy’s box kick was chased down superbly to secure a penalty for not releasing.
After 24 minutes the home side had a set piece in the opposition half for the first time, and crucially they made it count. Laurence Steen, who had a great game at wing forward, made the initial surge down the short side and presented the ball for Conroy. He fed out half Mike Walls whose chip over the Wexford defence took a wicked bounce backwards. The onrushing full back Robert Williams just had sufficient height to gather the ball at full stretch before darting through from close range for a try.
Conroy’s conversion from a difficult angle was good and Dundalk had a 7-0 lead.
However, Wexford gave a warning of the threat they posed in their back division in the 29th minute. Centre Corey Carty, who played with a number of Dundalk men on the Leinster Junior team last year, made a brilliant surge from his own half and Caraigh Geoghegan and Tom Brennan took the ball on further before the latter’s pass went just behind left wing Calum Murphy, giving the stretched home defence a chance to regroup.
Indeed, a penalty to the hosts allowed Patrick Reilly to boot Dundalk into the opposition 22, but a defensive box kick from Wexford scrum half Stu Ryan was brilliantly gathered by his lock forward John Turner and the visitors spent the latter stages of the first half pinned in the Dundalk 22.
Indeed, the hosts looked to be in trouble when they had Gonnelly sin-binned for bringing down a maul and Wexford secured lineout ball through Brennan after kicking to the corner. A clumsy knock-on handed 14-man Dundalk a brief reprieve on that occasion, but they had to survive another big scare right on half-time.
Wexford were awarded a penalty for a scrum infringement 10 metres out, but just when composure was called for their wing forward Luke Roche tried to take a quick tap and lost the ball forward in the process.
It was a huge moment in the game, and Dundalk made Wexford pay six minutes into the second half when Conroy stretched their lead to 10-0 with a well-struck penalty kick.
For a spell after that it looked like the hosts would use their game management skills to put the game beyond Wexford. Certainly, player coach Walls became increasingly influential, and a couple of fine kicks from Reilly helped pin the visitors back in their own territory.
Turnover ball secured by Bobby Clancy led to a breakout from Wexford’s brilliant replacement Richie Waters, but a forward pass stopped the visitors in their tracks just as they got into the 22.
When their captain Darragh Kehoe was sin-binned in the 75th minute their challenge looked to be fizzling out, but almost immmediately Steen saw yellow to even up the numbers once more and Waters kicked a really good penalty to put Wexford on the board.
There was just one minute of normal time remaining at that stage, but the Division 2 side threw everything but the proverbial kitchen sink at Dundalk.
Brilliant carries from Carty, Clancy, Waters and Murphy took them back into opposition territory and an increasingly nervous Dundalk then lost two lineouts on their own throw in the space of a minute.
Another fine backline move came to nothing as Carty’s final pass went to ground, and there was one more chance for Wexford deep into stoppage time when a cross-field kick into the in-goal area bounced just out of reach of the fleet-footed left wing Murphy.
Dundalk face a difficult-looking away trip to Wicklow in the last eight, while Wexford will return to league action.