Too much class
inches wide of the far post.
Wanderers had a set-piece opportunity of their own when McCabe’s free found Sean Heaney but the defender - despite being unmarked - failed to hit the target.
Fast-forward two minutes and City hadn’t learned their lesson. This time it was a corner from McCabe, Heaney was yet again the man to greet it but again he failed to even test Mark McNulty.
And Bray paid the penalty as they fell two behind on the stroke of half time. McNamee swung over a corner and both Garry Buckley and Graham Cummins got a touch to it before McLoughlin applied a finishing touch to send the home side well on their way to three points.
Kevin Lynch tried to offer a glimmer of hope with a strike from distance but McNulty dealt with it - even if it did take him two attempts.
Cork could have put the final nail in Bray’s coffin just four minutes into the second period when Moran failed to clear from the edge of his box and Sadlier came onto the ball but couldn’t find the unguarded net.
There 4,070 people in attendance and at least 4,065 of those were believed to be City fans so they would have cheered wholeheartedly as the contest was ended on 64 minutes. Moran will not want to watch this goal again as he spilled Sadlier’s cross and Cummins ruthlessly punished him as he tapped it in.
Gloss was added to the scoreline 15 minutes from time as Karl Sheppard crossed to the back stick and Garry Buckley met it emphatically to deliver the final blow. There was almost a consolation effort for Bray right at the death as Ronan Coughlan’s header dropped agonisingly wide but even that would have been too good to be true on a night that the Seagulls were simply overpowered by a superior side.
1. Mark McNulty; 22. Colm Horgan, 21. Conor McCarthy, 29. Sean McLoughlin, 20. Shane Griffin; 8. Conor McCormack, 7. Jimmy Keohane; 25. Barry McNamee, 26. Garry Buckley, 11. Kieran Sadlier; 9. Graham Cummins. SUBS: Karl Sheppard for McNamee (65); Josh O’Hanlon for Cummins (66); Aaron Barry for McLoughlin (76). Not used: Adam Cantwell, Danny Kane, Michael Howard, Steven Beattie.
CORK CITY:
29. Evan Moran;
12. Dylan Hayes, 4. Conor Kenna, 5. Sean Heaney, 3. Kevin Lynch; 16. Dan McKenna, 6. Paul O’Conor; 17. Daniel Kelly, 21. Gary McCabe, 7. Cory Galvin;
19. Ronan Coughlan. SUBS: Ger Pender for McCabe (69); Darragh Gibbons for Kenna (79); Shane Flynn for D. Kelly (83). Not used: Adam Dempsey, Calvin Rogers, Andrew McGovern, Jake Ellis.
BRAY WANDERERS: REFEREE: VENUE:
Damien MacGraith. Turner’s Cross, Cork. A PRECIOUS Omochere goal downed Wexford for the second time in eight months as Bray Wanderers crept past the Ferrycarrig side in an evenly-contested SSE Airtricity League Southern Elite Division Under-17 game in Ferrycarrig Park on Saturday.
Wexford will remember Omochere for his heart-breaking injury-time goal in the Under-15 quarter-final back in October, and his first-half finish was enough to beat the Yellowbellies on this occasion too.
The home side will have regrets once again for their inability to put the ball in the net and for probably the third time this season they have come away from a game with less points than they deserved.
They certainly had the better of the opening half hour before Bray went one up, and realistically all that stopped them from taking an early two-goal advantage was the outstanding performance of Enda Minogue in Bray’s goal.
He denied Robert Bulmer at point-blank range from an early corner, but his double save in the 15th minute was as good as you will see in the Under-17 Airtricity League.
Again from a corner, Kevin Murphy rose highest only to be denied by a stunning one-handed save. Bulmer was alive to the cross that followed and it looked as if he had side-footed past the netminder, but the same right arm stretched out and tipped the ball to safety.
It was a miscued Kyle Scallan clearance which allowed Omochere to score the game’s only goal, but Bulmer went closer than ever seven minutes later when his header from Caellum Travers-Devlin’s cross beat Minogue and came cannoning back off the post.
Wexford seemed to lose some belief after half-time and, while Bulmer still looked the most dangerous, he failed to direct any meaningful efforts on target. Bray were happy to sit on their lead and created very little.
The Model county side made a raft of changes in the hope of inspiring another turnaround but it never came.
They may have reason to feel hard done by when Gavin Keyes failed to award a penalty for clear contact on Travers-Devlin in injury time.
The game ended in a red mist when Roland Idowu was given a straight red card for a punch on Wexford’s Kevin Murphy.
Murphy himself and Cian Walsh of Bray were also both handed reds for their parts in the melee which followed.
Aaron Hall; Shane Gibson, Kyle Scallan (capt.), Kevin Murphy, Seán O’Brien-Murphy; Luke Greene, Caellum Travers-Devlin, Ethan O’Neill, Seán Smithers, Robert Bulmer; Brody Mur-
WEXFORD F.C.:
phy. Subs. - Graham O’Reilly for O’Neill (61), Darragh Levingston for Smithers (65), Killian Griffin for O’Brien-Murphy (77), Brian Byrne for Greene (77), James Dowling for Murphy (81), also Seán Maher, Cillian McDonald.
Enda Minogue; Cian Walsh, Cian Maher, Alex Rafferty (capt.); Glen Hollywood, Evan Dunne, Daniel Madaghjian, Steven Sweeney, Aaron Rice; Precious Omochere, Jake Ellis. Subs. - Byran O’Gorman for Omochere (43), Eoin Darcy for Ellis (59), Roland Idowu for Hollywood (83), also Conor Dowling, Panit O’Keeffe, Nikolay Borowiec, Jamie Crilly.
BRAY WANDERERS: REFEREE:
Gavin Keyes (Waterford).