Junior Football Championship: Mullingar Shamrocks 0-10 Athlone 1-7.
The optimistic statisticians in the club were of the opinion that this result maintains Shamrocks interest in the junior championship for the year and if (a big if) Shamrocks beat The Downs in the re-scheduled match we will be involved in a play-off for a quarter-final place. That such uncertainty exists reflects rather badly on the powers-that-be; it doesn’t require rocket science to produce an up-to-date league table on a regular basis showing club positions but in the absence of same, we wait and see (and in my case with more hope than confidence).
In this match played in Springfield, Shamrocks showed considerable improvement on their previous attempt at playing football against Rosemount and led by 0-8 to 0-3 at half-time. Anthony Clinton opened the scoring and Ritchie Greene responded in similar fashion for Athlone. John Ganly added a point using a skill that has almost disappeared from the game: the drop kick. A great goal scoring opportunity created by Darren Keena was somehow missed and at the final whistle this was crucial. Sean Maguire used the solo-run dummy to create the bit of space needed to pop over another point and John Ganly added another fine point. Darren Keena kicked two points, the second followed a great piece of combined play that involved James Grogan, Gary and Pearse Corroon and Anthony Clinton; Mark McLoughlin also pointed and after twenty minutes Shamrocks held a 0-7 to 0-1 lead. Anthony Clinton closed the scoring for Shamrocks and Ritchie Greene added two for Athlone before the referee called for an interval (0-8 to 0-3).
John Ganly and Ritchie Green shared points in the early stages of the second-half and Ross Corroon hit a fine point from a free to extend Shamrocks lead to six points. Unfortunately that was to be Shamrocks final score and for the last twenty-five minutes no flag was raised. Instead Ritchie Greene gave something of one-man-show in score-making and score-taking and added 1-3 to his personal tally before the final whistle and gave Greene the distinction of scoring Athlone’s entire total, the majority from play on a night when conditions for football were difficult.
Greene’s goal, from a Shamrocks perspective, was sloppy in the extreme whilst at the other end a brilliant Nathan Smyth effort almost smashed the cross-bar but rebounded into play. Nathan was unfortunate as the cross-bar deprived him of scoring what would have been the Shamrocks goal of the year to date. Both teams missed good chances to secure victory but great defending by Dermot Curley and Robert Ryan in particular enabled Shamrocks to survive and fight another day. Maybe! A notable feature of tonight’s match was the welcome return of Fiachra Spellman to the Shamrocks colours after a long absence. Final Score; Mullingar Shamrocks 0-10 Ritchie Greene 1-7.
Shamrocks: Daragh Ryan; Ryan Blundell, Robert Ryan, Dylan Ledwith; James Grogan (Fiachra Spellman), Paul Christie, Pearse Corroon; Ross Corroon (0-1) and Mark McLoughlin (0-1); Sean Maguire (0-1), John Ganly (0-3), Mickey McKnight (Dermot Curley); Darren Keena (0 -2), Anthony Clinton (0-2) and Gary Corroon (Nathan Smyth).
