Blake proud of Beale’s battling spirit as Leahy is left to rue path not taken

BEALE manager Ian Blake was understandably proud of his players for the manner in which they achieved victory.

“Last week in our victory over Duagh the lads showed great character to come back after being down at half-time and they showed that character again today. It’s a great achievement to win out there today, we were down the two lads through suspension [Paul Horgan and Declan Bambury were sent off against Duagh], but the lads that came in there today did a great job.”

Blake pointed to the two points before half time as being vital to his teams second half performance.

“We missed some very handy chances in the first half so the two points before half time had a massive bearing on the game. Six points to three down would have been a different story to going in 6-5 down especially when we were against the hill in the second half.

“We had a good chat at halftime. We were honest with each other and in fairness the lads dug deep again, I couldn’t have asked for any more from them. The likes of Cormac Linnane who carried great ball, Darragh Buckley and James McMahon were superb for us today, but in fairness all of the lads really stood up when we needed them.”

An emotional Ballyduff manager John Paul Leahy was understandably upset after his sides loss and you could sense the disappointment in his voice as he reflected on what might have been.

“We had a missed goal chance in the first half and they took their goal chances in the second half. You could see that if we kicked the ball into Mikey Boyle that he was winning it, but we just didn’t do it often enough.

“I suppose the lads were trying to be patient, they didn’t want to give away the ball, but at the end of the day there was plenty space inside there and we didn’t capitalise on it.”

Leahy said that his side would now focus on the County League, with another local derby coming up against Moyvane in two weeks time.

“I suppose we weren’t supposed to even get out of our group in the championship so to make the semi-final is a bonus. The aim is to get out of Division 5 in the county league, everyone knows that they are a talented bunch, they shouldn’t be below there, they should really be in mid table in Division 3.

“We will regroup and look forward to playing Moyvane.”