Sirocco FC 2-5 St Mary’s FC
St Mary’s welcomed back Cormac Morgan into the team following his recovery from a bout of illness for Saturday’s game against Sirocco FC at Dixon Park, Castlereagh.
The opening to the game had a familiar feel to it with the in-form St Mary’s pinning Sirocco back deep into their own half as skipper Patrick Ross fired narrowly over the top and Eoin O’Reilly struck an effort against the outside of the woodwork.
St Mary’s took the lead on fifteen minutes when O’Reilly’s shot was deflected beyond the Sirocco goalie while Jack Parke nearly doubled that lead stretching in vain to a ball cut back beyond his reach.
The St Mary’s defence were caught napping minutes before the break when the Sirocco midfielder burst clear and the resulting shot had Niall McGinnity well beaten to level the scores.
But Cathal McGarrity created an opening for O’Reilly to show enough strength to hold off the Sirocco rearguard before finishing to give St Mary’s a deserved interval lead.
St Mary’s, on terrific run of form in their domestic league at present dropped their guard at the start of the second period and Sirocco benefited from a fortuitous deflection of Oisin Donaghy to level the scores once again.
St Mary’s midfield star Cathal McGarrity was having more influence on proceedings as the game wore on and showed plenty of skill on forty minutes to twist and turn past several opponents before laying the ball off into the path of O’Reilly to edge St Mary’s in front for the third time.
But this time St Mary’s were in no mood to give up their advantage with Peter Morgan, Aidan Quinn, Oisin Donaghy and Jack Parke defending stoutly while at the other end Trevor McCormick, Christopher Flannigan and Eoin McNicholl all came close to increasing their advantage.
The full three points were sealed with minutes remaining when McNicholl’s measured cross left O’Reilly with the simple task of tapping the ball home and the predatory O‘Reilly added a fifth in injury time with McGarrity again doing the donkey work.
Man of the match: Cathal McGarrity (St Mary’s)
