This article is from page 85 of the 2009-10-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 85 JPG
BUNRATTY progressed to the next round of the Munster Junior cup after victory against Bridge Celtic B. Bun- ratty certainly justified their favour- ites tags with this good solid per- formance. Their preliminary round victory last week against Rhine Rovers certainly stood to them here and despite a number of injuries and a few players on Oscar Traynor duty
they still managed to grab a 2-1 win.
They dominated the first-half and looked far more likely to score com- pared to the hard working Bridge team. Bunratty launched a number of attacks but none resulted in a goal mainly due to some poor shooting and some great saves by the Bridge goalkeeper. They still continued to press though and even when this meant there was a lot more space for Bridge to create some counter attacks
neither team could find an opening OO Koam UOMO NCC EDI OOT- TEE
The second-half continued in the exact same fashion with Bunratty conveying their control on the game. Eventually after 60 minutes that first goal was found and with no Surprise it was taken by a Bunratty player. Midfielder Pat Twomey was the provider as his well judged effort bounced into the corner of the net.
This almost lifted a burden off the
Bunratty players as they now seemed to play with an even greater sense of confidence. They now doubled the work load of Bridge’s defence who were really at this stage just hanging on and hoping they could find some way back into the game. Unfortu- nately for them it was going to get a lot worse. With seventy five minutes gone they finally secured the vital second goal. This time it was sub Declan McDonald who proved to be a capable goal scorer. With one of his first major touches he doubled his team’s goal tally. He remained calm and slotted home his shot past the falling keeper. The heads of the Bridge players would surely drop now.
Bridge though had different plans. They still were going to fight on until the very end and hope they could finally pierce the Bunratty rearguard. They took their time and wasted two or three chances before they eventually did with five min- utes of the game remaining. Again it required the touch of a substitute as Jamie O’Gorman finally gave his team something to cheer about.
They went up the field now des- perately trying to find an equaliser but they just ran out of time. Overall Bunratty deserved this one and de- spite the wonderful efforts of Bridge at the end they just were not strong enough to win. Bunratty were more clinical and their two goals half way through the second half were the ul- timate difference.