Thursday night saw the U12s of Liatroim travel to Milltown to take on Warrenpoints’ mighty blues. Liatroim had been run extremely close a few weeks ago by our young warriors when they travelled to the far side of the Mournes in the regional section of the leagues. Last week Liatroim were well beaten when they travelled to Ballygalget, a team that considered themselves extremely lucky to have come away with a win two weeks ago when they scored their winning goal deep into injury time, to win by three against our lads. By contrast such is the unpredictability of this league that Cumann Pheadaír Naofa travelled to Bredagh, brimming with confidence in the expectation of a win, albeit minus three of their main guys and were sent home a well beaten side having not played the usual brand of Warrenpoint hurling that has come to be their style. With team morale once again high and on a fantastic day for playing the boys took on the mighty Liatroim.
Liatroim started the game well when they scored two points, one a free from thirty metres in front of the goals. Cumann Pheadaír Naofa replied with an Oran Murney point when he collected the sliotar out on the side line twenty metres from goal, he took his three steps, rounded his marker and slotted over the bar, a fantastic inspirational point. Liatroim then got the stroke of luck that was to give them the breathing space they wanted, having been matched all over the field and once more finding their opponents in blue well able to cause an upset, if allowed to hurl. A long ball in to the heart of the blues defence saw a Liatroim forward find the smallest of room and even though his stroke was poor it took a sharp deflection that saw it end up in the Cumann Pheadaír Naofa net. Liatroim were now playing the sliotar in long in an effort to bypass the excellent catching of Oisín Ruane at half back who wasn’t giving his marker an easy time. With James Sweeney, Mark Campbell and Caolan Freer sweeping up any loose balls and clearing the danger in defence it was up to Matthew Duffy to move forward and support his midfielders Tiernan Kelly, Liam O’Connor and Darragh Austin. Again Murney struck for a second point to keep the blues in contention. Up front the blues were struggling with danger man Jarlath Donnelly, one of the smallest players being marked by a player literally twice his size. This did not deter the lion hearted wee man as he along with Ruairí McIntyre and Ben Lock gave the Liatroim defence plenty to keep an eye on after their scoring exploits a few weeks ago. Although going in at half time down by five point the blues were still in the game and were looking forward to another 25 minutes’ action.
Disaster struck when Liatroim forged further ahead with two very quick goals at the start of the second half and when the Sliotar was delivered long into the heart of the Liatroim goalmouth it took Jarlath Donnelly to keep the scoreboard ticking when he instinctively doubled on the sliotar as it hoped invitingly in front of him, only to see it whistle over the bar, much to the Liatroim keeper’s relief. Cumann Pheadaír Naofa once more threatened the Liatroim keeper when Ben Lock pulled on a loose sliotar outside of the square only to see it agonisingly go wide of the post. With time up it was Liatroim who once more triumphed over the blues, but much praise was heaped on the young hurlers who did everything but score more than their opponents. The boys now look forward to a trip away to Bredagh next week.
