One-goal victory for St Patrick’s Castleisland
A WET and windy afternoon in Cahersalee, Tralee, this week played host to the Joe O’Connor U-16 colleges final between St Patrick’s Secondary School, Castleisland and Gaelcholáiste Chiarraí, Tralee.
St Patrick’s were slow out of the blocks and trailed from the beginning after conceding the opening point of the game. Adam Kelly opened St Patrick’s scoring with an excellently taken team score.
However, Gaelcholáiste hit the front again with an early goal, and the Tralee side were taking full advantage of the wind in the first half, kicking some excellent scores. Connie O’Connor and Tadhg O’Shea just about kept St Patrick’s in touching distance with two superb points from play.
St Patrick’s were finding scores hard to come by against a defensively solid Tralee side and at the other end, the fullback line of Luke O’Connell, Matthew O’Connor and James Bailey were made to work hard.
Huge credit must be given to these lads for keeping St Patrick’s within range midway through the first half.
As the first half wore on, St Patrick’s started to gain more control around the middle of the field, with Adam Jensen and Jason Brennan to the fore.
With two minutes to go to half time, St Patrick’s trailed by six points when they were awarded a 21-yard free.
Up stepped Connie O’Connor and, with the Gaelcholáiste backs walking towards their goal line, he seized his opportunity to finish the ball sublimely to the bottom corner of the net.
This gave his team a huge boost going in at half time and made the challenge ahead a bit more manageable. The half-time score was St Patrick’s Castleisland 1-4 Gaelcholáiste Chiarraí 1-7.
The second half began in similar fashion, with the Tralee side scoring the opening two points. St Patrick’s responded with scores from John Bell and Connie O’Connor. Gaelcholáiste came wave after wave in attack and went further ahead with some well-taken points from frees.
Mid way through the second half, St Patrick’s again fell behind by six points. However, with Raymond O’Neill and Shane Óg McGaley beginning to assert themselves more and more on the game and John Curtin and Sean O’Sullivan working tirelessly around the middle third, St Patrick’s slowly started to gain a foot-hold. Vital scores came from John Bell and Connie O’Connor, and suddenly St Patrick’s were only three points down.
Then came the bit of luck which they needed to turn this game around. A long ball into the square by Tadhg O’Shea fell kindly to the livewire Jason Brennan, who nonchalantly slotted the ball into the net. With 10 minutes to go the sides were level, 2-9 to 1-12.
For the next five minutes St Patrick’s took over in midfield, with John Bell fielding some excellent ball and Sean Cronin, Nathan O’Callaghan and Mark O’Connor making a big impression on the game after being introduced from the bench.
St Patrick’s sensed they had gained the momentum. The outstanding Jason Brennan, Darragh Kelly and Connie O’Connor kicked some fantastic points in this period of dominance.
Tadhg O’Shea, who led by example throughout the game, put St Patrick’s four points ahead going into injury time.
For the final three minutes, St Patrick’s had to halt the onslaught from the Tralee attackers as they came looking for the goal they needed to get back into the game. Cian Ring in goal, who marshalled his defence throughout, ensured they were only coming away with a single point during this time, and St Patrick’s ended the game victorious with a threepoint winning margin.