All Ireland Cup Quarter Final

Creggs RFC 60 – St.Marys RFC 28

Creggs made the daunting journey to Limerick city to face St Marys in a novel All Ireland Junior Cup quarter-final pairing on Saturday afternoon. Creggs scored a brilliant try in the 7th minute when the backs broke from deep to release winger Mikey Dunne for a wonderful team try. Moments later Cregg scored another try by Shane Dowd after Mark Purcell and Eoghan Coyle made breaks. Purcell converted for a 12 nil lead. Creggs scored two more tries with Shane Dowd scoring his second try under the posts before Cormac Dolan raced clear for 4th try for the Connacht representatives. Ronan Dowd extracted maximum advantage with two well judged conversions for a 26 nil lead after 18 minutes. St Marys hit back with a try from Paul Loughlin converted by Adam Guerin. St Marys got 7 more on the 33rd minute, Creggs hit back with a try by winger Dean O’Reilly for a superb try leaving score at 31-14. Marys hit back immediately for their third try by Ruairi O’Donnell which Guerin converted to leave the visitors 10 points ahead at half time. The second half started with Dean O’Reilly charging down a clearance racing to score 5 more. Moments later a fine break by Mikey Dunne resulted in powerful center Mark Purcell crashing over for a seventh try with Ronan Dowd landing an exquisite conversion for a 43 21 lead. A brilliant crossfield kick by Mark Purcell led to another try by Dean O’Reilly in the 66th minute converted by Purcell from the touch line. O’Reilly scored his fourth try of the afternoon in the closing stages after great work by Dunne in the build-up. A notable feature of this outstanding victory is that all ten tries were scored by the backs with the platform laid by a totally committed forward unit which yielded nothing to a very physical, powerful home pack.

 

  

 

 

St Marys kept going to the end and deservedly crossed for a try by fullback Loughlin before Creggs Chris Duignan closed out the scoring in a quite amazing game of rugby football. Creggs now advance to the All Ireland Junior Cup semifinal,and await the draw with Athy, Dromore and Seapoint or Wicklow still in the mix for a Cup final spot.