Geraldines completed a fantastic double on Tuesday evening, with their Junior Ladies taking the Junior B Championship with a 5-11 to 1-10 victory over Cooley Kickhams.
This final marked the culmination of a very successful and competitive Junior B championship involving junior teams from Gleann Mhairtin, St Brides, Clan na Gael as well as the two finalists.
The Gers came out on top in the final gaining revenge for their defeat to Cooley in the group stages.
Match Report to follow…
Mattock Rangers 3-21 Cuchullan Gaels/Dowdallshill 5-06
Last weekend Mattock Rangers marked their return to footballing matters after a 12 month absence by taking the Junior A Championship title after a hugely entertaining final in Young Irelands GFC.
That they did so was down in no small way to another brilliant display from ex Louth star Maria Reid who formed a formidable attacking partnership with player of the match Abbie O’Brien with the duo contributing 2-16 of the winners tally.
Barry Englishby’s side got off to the perfect start when Maria Reid cut through the Cuchullan/Dowdallshill defence and fired to the net after just two minutes. The same player added a point soon after before the combination side received a major boost as Erin McLaughlin found the net in the sixth minute
Rangers came back as Reid(2) and O’Brien added points but similar scores from Erin McLaughlin and Louise Corrigan left it 1-4 to 1-2 in the eleventh minute. The combination did have a let off moments later when Louise Corrigan was very unlucky to see her effort come back off the crossbar.
Points from Reid and O’Brien did extend the lead to four, but the north Louth girls were back in the game with a well worked goal as Michelle O’Hagan won possession and her accurate pass found Caoimhe Creighton whose shot found the net despite keeper Anna Brennan getting a hand to it but could’nt prevent it crossing the line to reduce the defecit to the minimum.
Mattock came back with points from Sarah Noone and Corrigan before impressive midfielder Caoimhe Creighton having been denied a second goal by a fine save by the Collon keeper moments earlier , eventually got her second major, a powerful run was finished with a vicious shot which gave Mattock net minder Anna Brennan no chance in the 20th minute 3-2 to 1-8.
Mattock had three of the next four points from the reliable Maria Reid before Caoimhe Creighton completed her hat-trick, with another superb finish putting her side in front for the first time 4-3 to 1-11.
But it was Mattock who again moved through the gears as first keeper Una Pearson did well to push away Maria Reid’s goal bound shot, while they hit three unanswered points from Niamh Dooley, Sarah Noone and Reid to leave them 1-14 to 4-03 in front at the break
As in the opening half the Collon side started the better with two points from play-maker Abbie O’Brien before the Cuchullan/Dowdallshill outfit stemmed the tide as they fashioned another goal chance with Erin McLaughlin denied by a brilliant save by Anna Brennan.
Mattock dominated the next quarter and stretched their lead further courtesy of points from O’Brien(2) Maria Reid and Rebecca Smith leaving them 1-21 to 4-06 ahead entering the last ten minutes
The Black and Red clad team then put the tie firmly beyond their opponents as a Maria Reid shot was parried by Una Pearson with Sarah Noone in like a flash to finish to the net.
Rebecca Lambe Fegan did give the combination a glimmer of hope as her shot was pushed away by Anna Brennan but the county minor keeper lashed home the rebound.
Fittingly Abbie O’Brien had the last say as she put the gloss on a fine individual performance with her side’s third goal late on.
Mattock Rangers star Maria Reid felt a strong team effort was key to their success; “The victory was a great team performance, we had’nt played as well as a team in any of our league matches. So thankfully we produced the goods when we needed to. 3-21 was super scoring . Abbie O’Brien was tremendous on the ’40’ scoring 1-06.
Our U16 players Lucy Watters, Rebecca Smith and Louise Corrigan played a big part today and also in our league matches. They have really given the Adult set up a lift as they bring energy and fitness to the squad. This will definatley help us to drive us on again and hopefully we can get a few more younger girls to join the set up next year.
Intermediate Championship is going to be a big step up for us but we will relish the challenge and see how we get on.
This final was absolutely fantastic. It was a great spectacle of Ladies football, end to end stuff with plenty of superb scores from both teams. We knew it was going to be a tough battle.
We played Cuchullan/Dowdalllshill in our first league match in OMeath and yet again that was a great game of football where we came out winners by five points. Going into this final we were missing one of our main scoring forwards Grainne Rath due to a serious head injury sustained against Cooley B a week before in a league match. The timing of the injury was unfortunate but we all had to put our heads down and focus on the job in hand,” concluded the Mattock scoring hero
Mattock Rangers; Anna Brennan, Eimear Grimes, Lisa Duff, Niamh McComish, Lucy Watters, Anna Dunne, Anna O’Reilly, Olive Maguire, Niamh Dooley,0-01, Sarah Noone,1-02, Abbie O’Brien 1-06 Rebecca Smith, 0-01,Rita Mullen, Maria Reid 1-10 Louise Corrigan 0-01 Sub. Kayla Farnan
Cuchullan Gaels/Dowdallshill; Una Pearson. Emily Ward, Francine O’Hagan, Denim McLaughlin. Ailbhe Ford, Rebecca Lambe Fegan,1-00, Emma McArdle, Caoimhe Conroy, Caoimhe Creighton 3-01,Tara Rogers, Michelle O’Hagan, 0-03, Siobhain O’Hagan, Eireann McLaughlin, 1-01,Sarah Roe, Caoimhe Rogers Subs used; Aine Morgan Kerri Kerr
Report by Dermot Woods | Photos by Warren Matthews
