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2007/08

Schoolboy Results

U-15's

Thursday, November 01, 2007 :

Article from Kingdom Archives

Soccer: Listowel mastermind win

Under-15 National Cup
Mastergeeha 1 Listowel Celtic 4

THIS should have been a Battle of the Titans in Kerry at this age group as both teams had extended runs in last year’s Under 14 National Cup.

Cherry Orchard of Dublin defeated Listowel in the last 32 stage and they subsequently beat Mastergeeha in the next round to book their place in the quarter-final.

However, this Mastergeeha side is only a pale shadow of the team that played so well last April, having lost four key players since then. Indeed, these teams had already met in the league a few weeks ago and it was Listowel who won at their ease.

It was always going to be difficult for Mastergeeha to raise their game after that defeat, but with the assistance of a couple of younger players, they managed to put in a better performance, though it was never going to be enough against a very experienced Listowel team.

Patrick Costello had the first opportunity for Lis-towel when he was on the end of a Brian Murphy cross but he failed to make a proper connection with the ball in front of goal and Joe Donovan cleared the danger for Mastergeeha.

Shortly afterwards, Mastergeeha striker, Tadhg Ryan had a shot from outside the box that drifted narrowly wide.

Then in the 10th minute, Listowel had a shot on target from out-side the box that Shane Murphy did well to save but the ball squirmed from his grasp and Patrick Costello was quickest to react and he smashed the ball to the roof of the net to give Listowel the lead.

There is no doubt that, overall, Listowel had the better quality players but they were not creating any clear-cut chances in the first half. Mastergeeha’s midfielder Gary O’Leary was causing problems for Listowel, winning a lot of free-kicks in the middle of the park. However, Se·n Lane in the Listowel goal managed to deal with everything that was thrown at him, but there were a couple of very anxious moments for Listowel as the home team came in search of an equaliser before half-time, but it was no to be.

Mastergeeha would have been happy enough at that stage but whatever hope they had at half-time was killed off in the first minute of the second half, when Mark Reen got on the end of a sweeping move my Listowel and rifled the ball to the net.

Tommy O’Sullivan tried to get Mastergeeha back into the game almost immediately and when the ball was played out wide to him he looked to have no where to go, but a beautiful back-flick and first time cross gave Mastergeeha a chance to score from the resulting corner, but alas for the home side, Tadhg Ryan’s header went over the crossbar.

Listowel upped their performance in the second half and when Paudie Quinn scored with a tremendous strike from 20 yards, they were home and dry.

The icing on the cake was when Cathal White’s free kick from just inside the half-way line went straight to the net to make it 4-0 to Listowel.

To their credit, Mastergeeha never gave up and produced some good passages of play at times and when Ryan Carroll was taken down in the penalty area at the end of a good move, Tadhg Ryan converted the spot-kick to Mastergeeha some consolation on the day.

Mastergeeha: Shane Murphy, Enda O’Sullivan, Joe Donovan, Sean Daly, Ger Sheehan, Tommy O’Sullivan, Ian Devane, Gary O’Leary, Ryan O’Carroll, Padraig Nagle and Tadhg Ryan.

Listowel Celtic: Se·n Lane, Micheal Lynch, Jonathon McCoy, Cathal White, Jamie Barry, Brian Murphy, David Cullhane, Paudie Quinn, Mark Reen, Patrick Costello and James McCarthy.