A bad start to Aghabullogue’s quest for honours in this year’s championship. The boys were well beaten by Canovee in a match that promised much but delivered little. It was plain to see that Canovee had a lot more work done with this team than Aghabullogue had. The home team started the better and moved easily into a two point lead before Aghabullogue found the pace of the game.
Aghabullogue’s first score was a point from a free from David Thompson. Our full forward line of Tadgh Bradley, David Thompson and Conor Dineen looked dangerous but not enough ball was finding its way to them. Matthew Bradley equalized with a great point from play and with 15 minutes gone Aghabullogue were looking like the team that could grab a hold of this game. Paul Ring, Paul Dilworth, Shane Tarrant and Tadgh Bradley were playing some great football. Sean lane and Thompson put Aghabullogue one ahead and things were looking good for the boys in green and white.
Canovee began piling on the pressure once more in midfield and pulled a point back. They followed this with their first of 3 goals to leave it 1.04 to 0.04 at half time.
Canovee started the better in the second half and were full of running. It was obvious to everyone that they had been putting a lot of effort into preparing for this match and their team play was much sharper that Aghabullogues. The loss of David Thompson to a red card was a huge blow to Aghabullogue and what made it more painful to take was that it was unjustified. With both teams down to 14 men Canovee started to let loose and scored some great points. With 10 minutes left they scored their second goal, a well taken penalty. Three minutes later they got their third goal and the game was essentially a done deal. Matthew Bradley got 3 points in the second half and Tadgh Bradley scored 1.
Canovee fully deserved their win and now go into the draw for the quarter final. Aghabullogue will face Iveleary in the losers round next weekend. They will find this tie a particularly tough one as well.
Aghabullogue
1.Daniel Lane
2.Denis Desmond
3.Shane Tarrant
4.Killian Barry Murphy
5.Jack Murphy
6.Paul Ring
7.Sean Lane (0.1)
8.Sean O’Connell
9.Conor Smith
10.Tom Long
11.Matthew Bradley (0.04 (2F))
12.Paul Dilworth
13.Conor Dineen
14.David Thompson (0.02 F)
15.Tadgh Bradley (0.01 F)
Subs Luke Casey for Conor Dineen (black card), Jack Oldham for Sean Lane , Paul Dineen for Tadgh Bradley.
Coachford News 