Cumann Pheadaír Naofa 5-6
Castlewellan 4-1
The U12s of Cumann Pheadaír Naofa travelled away to a cold, but sunny Castlewellan on Thursday night. These two sides last met three weeks ago to kick off the start of the south Down league when the weather was only slightly better. On that occasion the ‘town side came away with the spoils having grabbed the opportunity to take the lead in the second half of that match. Since then the boys in blue again came across the Castlewellan lads in the guise of the primary schools féile, again the Castlewellan boys were victorious on the day. St Peters having travelled minus the services of Darragh Austin and Caolan Freer you could have put this down to strike three for the Warrenpoint side. But in a devil may care move and to give the blues a different experience on the field and hopefully unveil a new option to the side the boys were put into unfamiliar positions and so the side was a much changed one to the side that took to the field three weeks earlier. Defender James Sweeney was between the posts and just in front of him were forwards Oran Murney, Liam O’Connor, Jarlath Donnelly & Niall Rice.
From the start there was a determination that today the blues weren’t going to let Castlewellan get away with another victory. A goal form Mark Campbell and Tiernan Burns and an Oran Murney point had the blues off to an excellent start before Castlewellan had scored a point. Two further points from midfielder Tiernan Kelly pushed the blues into an eight-point advantage. With Ben Lock & Matthew Duffy up front the sliotar seems to be stuck inside the Castlewellan half as Tiernan Kelly and Mark Campbell proved to be a real pain for the home side who found their battling, strength and overall play a dangerous threat throughout the whole game. With just five minutes to go in the half the Castlewellan sides tackling and blocking were rewarded when they worked the sliotar down in to the St Peters goal mouth and scrambled the ball over the line for a goal and followed it up with a second two minutes later to reduce the Warrenpoint lead to just two points, 2-3 to 2-1.
When young Ruairí McIntyre drew a free at the start of the second half, Mark Campbell comfortably split the posts from 40m out. The Castlewellan boys, who had played second fiddle to their opponents for most of the first half, were now a lot more clinical with their possession and managed to even up the score when they clawed back a goal, but live wire Oran Murney soon had that cancelled when he grabbed the first of his two of the night. Castlewellan raised their game further and presented Cumann Pheadaír Naofa with a real battle as a forth goal saw the sides level again midway through the half. Thankfully for managers Dermot & Chris this proved to be the last score their side would concede as the persistence of Tiernan Kelly drew a free which he pointed with ease. Now just a point ahead, up stepped Oran Murney once more to score a great goal and put the blues well in control of the result. As if to empathise the injustice of the last few weeks a long ball into the square saw Ben Lock pull on the loose sliotar for another blues green flag. To finish off the night Oran showed great poise and talent to loft another strike over the bar. Much praise was given to the boys in the dressing room as they walked back to the bus, heads held high and full of pride in the blue jersey.
CPN scorers: Oran Murney 2-2, Mark Campbell 1-1, Tiernan Burns 1-0, Ben Lock 1-0, Tiernan Kelly 0-3
