Sligo RFC 14 Creggs RFC 25
Creggs U16’s travelled to Sligo last Sunday morning in a top of the table clash against Sligo RFC and came away with a 25-14 win. Sligo played the first half against the wind and kept the ball in the forwards however Creggs defended well around the fringes with Dara Byrne, Adam Finnerty, John Martin and Melvin Conteh prominent. After 15 minutes Creggs eventually started to put some phases together and took the lead after Danny Arnold crashed over from close range to take a 5-0 lead. Straight from the kick off Creggs kicked the ball back into the Sligo RFC and after some pressure forced a 5 metre scrum, from this scrum some good work from Ian Conlon, Brian Maloney and David O Gorman produced good ball for Eoghan Coyle to pick from the back of the ruck and break the tackle to dive over a try which gave Creggs a 12-0 lead. Creggs continued to attack and from a couple of phases Shane Purcell spread the ball wide to Jason Hoare who was just held short and Eoghan Coyle again picked and dived over for a try which Ronan Dowd converted giving Creggs a 17-0 half time lead.
Against the wind in the second half it was Creggs turn to keep the ball tight and they managed to keep Sligo in their own half and managed to take a lead when they put pressure on the back of the Sligo scrum and when the ball was turned over, first Daire Byrne was held short and then Danny Arnold was just held up before Creggs moved the ball wide through the backs for Niall Cunniffe to score in the corner giving Creggs a 22-0 lead. It was Sligo who were now taking control of the ball and territory as Creggs tired against the wind, From a shortened line out on the 22”, Sligo cut through the Creggs defence to score under the posts which they converted, reducing the deficit to 22-7. Sligo immediately kicked Creggs back into their own 22” and after some sustained picking and driving, Creggs defence creaked and Sligo found the gaps to score under the posts again to reduce the deficit to 22-14 with 10 minutes remaining.
Creggs now realised they were in a game and upped the performance for the last 10 minutes and a penalty from Shane Purcell 5 minutes from time secured the victory and made the points safe. Creggs will now play Castlebar RFC in the next round of the cup in Creggs next weekend. Time to be confirmed. Training has changed for this week only to Thursday night at 7pm in Creggs.