U14 had their first game of 2019 today, a challenge game against a taller/stronger Killeavy. In bitter cold conditions Killeavy, playing with the wind were quickest out of the blocks, scoring three goals & 6 points in the first half. In defence Sean Greenan, Conaire McMahon & Seon Maginn hurled fantastically well given that this was their first outing. The midfield pairing of Fionn Matthews & Mikey Keohane didn’t look out of place, being well supported by Oisin Gambold. Killeavy, having had several games under belt from their county Féile last week had a major threat in Miceal Rice, whose long rangy runs was the cause of main concern from the blues side-line.
Up front the blues had good performances from Ruairí McIntyre & Jarlath Donnelly with the pace of Rónán McShane ever present around the 21m line and Oisin McGivern at the edge of the square.
In the second half the blues made great progress managing to reduce the score difference, scoring three well taken and opportunistic goals, with McShane and McGivern (twice). With Mathews now doing a marking job on the Killeavy danger man Rice, the blues really took the game to Killeavy with Sean Crawford now controlling matters from the rear, bringing McShane, McIntyre and Keohane into the game to lift the tempo.
Overall John Murphy & Dermot Donnelly were very impressed with the team’s performance given the side were missing several keys players and the weather conditions were not conducive to expressing feats of great skill.
