The Newcastle and District Amateur Football League.
Premier Division.
Venue: The Meadow.
Ardglass 1 V 1 Celtic Boys.
Ardglass entertained near neighbours Celtic Boys in windy conditions at the Meadow. Both sides were highly competitive throughout and never gave the opposition time to settle on the ball and harried and chased everything. Both sets of defenders had to be at their best to stem the constant attacking threats writes Cyril McKinney.
After only 5 minutes Ardglass were forced into a change when Crangle got injured stretching to clear a ball being replaced by Kearney. Just 5 minutes later Celtic Boys took the lead when McCoubrey seized advantage of a lucky break in the box and lashed the ball past Armstrong as he advanced to narrow the angle.
Ardglass responded well and O’Connor forced Curran in the visitors nets to a good save before they got back in the game on 20 minutes.
Ardglass won a throw-in on their right wing level with the edge of the box and from Kearney’s long throw Magee rose highest and glanced a great near-post header past a static Curran into the far corner of the net.
The rest of the first half saw neither side create any clear cut chances with the wind causing havoc and both sides found it difficult to get the ball down under control and play their passing game. Connolly, Carberry and Fitzpatrick were not giving anything away at the back for Celtic whilst for Ardglass McEvoy, O’Shea and the veteran Taggart curtailed the lively Celtic front two of McCoubrey and Gibney.
Minutes into the second half and both sides found themselves down to 10 men. After what appeared to be a fifty-fifty challenge involving Ardglass’s McEvoy and Celtic’s Fitzpatrick both players reacted and were both shown a straight red card.
As the second half developed both teams created a few half chances with Ardglass looking the more likely to score, but each time Curran in the visitors nets was in excellent form to keep out efforts from Magee on 53 minutes, Deegan on 55 minutes and 73 minutes. Celtic Boys had a chance on 61 minutes after good work on the left flank from Williams-McCabe, the ball broke to Casey who blasted his shot over the bar.
In the end a draw was a fair result although Ardglass may well feel they shaded things overall.
Ardglass FC: Mark Armstrong, Brian Crangle, Cailan O’Shea, Neil Taggart, Christian O’Connor,Matthew Rooney, Aidy Watson, John Beattie, Mark Magee, Stephen Deegan. Subs: Sean Paul Halpin for O’Shea, Conor Kearney for Crangle.
Celtic Bhoys Nathan Curran, Shaun Megahay, Ryan Fitzpatrick, Gary Carberry, Blaine Connolly, Corey McCartan, Barry Teacy, Peter Casey, Jay Gibney, Jordan McCoubrey, Nergus Williams- McCabe; Subs: Conor Doherty for Carberry, Caolin Logue for Casey, Conaill Kerr for McCartan
