Avonmore turn on the style to see off battling Coolboy
AVONMORE FC COOLBOY RANGERS 4 0
A stunning finish to this game from Avonmore put the finishing touches to a fine evening’s work as they lifted the Under-14 A1 Shield title thanks to a 4-0 victory over a battling Coolboy Rangers at Bridgewater Centre Park last weekend.
A game that had been reasonably close between two willing sides was turned on its head at the death when two strikes in rapid succession sent Avonmore from a 2-0 lead to a 4-0 cushion after a very impressive performance from the Rathdrum outfit.
The winners held a slender 1-0 advantage at the break, their goal coming from slight hesitancy in the Coolboy defence that had been very solid up to that point.
There had been chances at both ends leading up to Avonmore’s opener after 20 minutes with James Murray having the pick of the bunch when the ball broke in the Coolboy square with Murray driving over the crossbar from a promising position.
However, a swift break down the right wing and a slight delay in clearing the danger saw a wicked cross swung in and Avonmore’s Sean Fleming was on hand to finish to the back of Louis Judge’s net.
Wides for Ciaran Lambert for Coolboy and Ryan Kavanagh for Avonmore followed as the action moved up and down the field in an entertaining affair in the fading daylight. The last chance of the half would fall to Christian Carter for Avonmore but his header from a Cathal Baker cross was wide of the target and we looked set for another nip and tuck 35 minutes in the second half.
Avonmore doubled their lead nine minutes into that second period when Christian Carter fired home.
Coolboy threw everything at Avonmore with Ruairi O’Brien causing headaches with long-distance frees into the area but Avonmore held out and then stormed home with those two wicked late goals, the first from Sean Fleming and the last from Cathal Baker who drove home hard to the top corner of the Coolboy net like a dagger to the heart.
A reasonable game played under the lights in Bridgewater Centre Park for the most part in third game of a triple header of finals with plenty of talent on show for both sides.