Under-21 Football Championship: Mullingar Shamrocks 0-14 Milltownpass 1-17.

Mullingar Shamrocks departed from the 2017 championship at the first hurdle after losing to Milltownpass in Springfield on Tuesday evening. Milltownpass dominated the first-half and with the assistance of a strong wind led at the interval by 1-11 to 0-7. Shamrocks had coped well with the conditions and the half-time deficit was by no means surmountable. Milltownpass opended the scoring but a great Tye Adamson run ended with a pass to Ross Corroon who scored a neat point.  Milltownpass added three more points and only a superb save by Dj prevented a goal; Dj was one of Shamrocks stars on the night and apart from his shot stopping expertise his kick outs were also excellent. Fintan Coyne was always dangerous and he scored a few fine first-half points (and a few more in the second half). A superb Pearse Corroon block-down began a move that ended with a neat Darren Keena point. Tye Adamson, also kicked excellently into the wind and he scored five points, three of which were superb frees, kicked off the ground just like the old time free taking specialists used to do.  

In the second-half Milltownpass added the points necessary to protect their lead; Ross Corroon (free) and Fintan Coyne exchanged points immediately after the interval and Darren Keena followed with another one of his sweet points. However, over the next eight minutes Milltownpass outscored Shamrocks 0-4 to 0-1 and essentially secured the match in this period of dominance (1-16 to 0-10). The only Shamrocks response was a fine Pearse Corroon point. However, this young Shamrocks team refused to die and points by Tye Adamson (0-2) and Pearse Corroon (0-1) as well as a good save by Dj kept the hopes alive. Unfortunately time waits for no team  and a Milltownpass point and a Tye Adamson closed the scoring.

Milltownpass were worthy winners but Shamrocks extracted many positives from this defeat; we fielded a very young team (all but one is eligible next year), a number of players played very well (Dj, Tye, Ross and Pearse Corroon, Dylan Matthews, Dylan Ledwith, Marc Eivers and Darren Keena) , the spirit was good, some fine football was played, Tye Adamson reintroduced us to his free taking talents and, most importantly of all perhaps, it was great to see Jordan Ward make a comeback after being side-lined with injury for nine months.

Mullingar Shamrocks: Dj Fedronas; Dylan Ledwith, James Shaw, Cormac Murphy; Stephen Hassett, Dylan Matthews, Sam Gilmartin; Pearse (0-2) and Ross Corroon (0-2); Ken O’Reilly (Jordan Warde), Tye Adamson (0-8), Cormac Darby (Marc Eivers); David Culkin (Conor Bracken), Darren Keena (0-2), Matthew Maslin.