The Village Barn Senior LGF Championship: Mullingar Shamrocks 0-4 Milltown 0-8

Our Senior LGF team have been having a tough time of it recently with many established players absent for a variety of reasons. The missing ones include Niamh and Cliodhna Spellman, Honor MacNamara, Laura Whitelaw, Sophie Hegarty, Emma Morris, Holly McCormack, Clara Thornton and when two of our current county players, Susanna Buckley and Anna Jones, were unavoidably absent for the latest encounter against Milltown, a game plan with a strong emphasis on defence was designed and implemented effectively.

The emphasis on defence challenged Karen Hegarty and Chloe Smullen up-front and the two combined for the opening score with Karen beating several Milltown players to create the opportunity for Chloe who scored a neat point. Milltown responded with points by Clodagh and Rachel Dillon, Nicole Feery and Leanne Slevin. In between these scores, there were several passages of excellent and patient defending by the Shamrocks players. A pointed free by Karen Hegarty before the interval was a just reward for a very good first half team performance.

The second half was essentially a repeat of the first with Milltown again outscoring Shamrocks 0-4 to 0-2. Chloe Smullen was again the first to score and her early point following a pinpoint pass from Jenna Kelly was followed by points from Tracey Dillon, Kelly Boyce Jordan, Sarah Dillon and Leanne Slevin before Karen Hegarty closed the scoring with a pointed free. Again, there was lots of good defending with the full back line of Annemarie O’Reilly, Siobhán O’Donnell and Melek Fagan leading by example and the safe handling of Lauren McCormack displayed why she is the outstanding goalkeeper in the county.

Mullingar Shamrocks: Lauren McCormack; Annemarie O’Reilly, Siobhán O’Donnell, Melek Fagan; Chloe Swarbrigg, Caoimhe Gaffney, Máiread Newman; Tara Fagan, Rachel Cheevers (Sinead Sweeney); Jenna Kelly, Karen Hegarty (0-2), Micaela O’Connor; Chloe Smullen (0-2), Shona McNicholas), Alison Bane.