SBYL u12s - David Winter Cup
Sirocco FC 0-5 St Mary’s
Unbeaten in their three David Winter league cup games to-date, St Mary’s travelled to Dixon Park, Castlereagh, home of Sirocco FC on Wednesday night with one notable positional change pushing Patrick Ross up into attack to partner O’Reilly.
Sirocco were a changed team and despite their lowly league finish, their recent results had improved somewhat to make the destination of the three points much more than a forgone conclusion.
St Mary’s opened brightly and after seven minutes following an Eoin McNicholl corner kick, Oisin Donaghy had an effort charged down while Patrick Ross forced a good save from the Sirocco goalkeeper.
Sirocco were unfortunate not to reply when Cormac Morgan conceded a free kick 25 yards from his own goal and the impressive Sirocco no.8 crashed the ball of Quinn’s crossbar and the rebound again bounced to safety of the woodwork for a second time.
Eoin O’Reilly threatened up the other end scooping the ball narrowly wide while midfield man Cathal McGarrity struck the Sirocco post from close range. As played raged from end to end, St Mary’s keeper Quinn earned his stripes diverting the ball onto the base of the post with his legs to keep his clean sheet intact.
Sirocco continued to live dangerously in defence, attempting to play the ball out from defence on most occasions. While I admire their new found footballing philosophy, the motto ‘don’t run before you can walk’ springs to mind and Sirocco ultimately paid a heavy price when Eoin O’Reilly controlled a ball on twenty minutes and fed McNicholl who finished well from 20 yards.
The next goal followed minutes later when McNicholl’s corner was stabbed home by the in-form Cathal McGarrity and O’Reilly added to the scoreline when picking up a Ross pass to score.
Sirocco lined out for the second half cursing their bad finishing and continued to put pressure on the St Mary’s defence but Breen, Begley, Donaghy and Morgan stood firm with Trevor McCormick and Oran McNaughton protecting their defensive line.
With St Mary’s determined to seal the points, a McNicholl cross-cum-shot from out on the right had the Sirocco keeper struggling and as the ball came back off the cross bar, Eoin O’Reilly was in the right place at the right time to gleefully nudge it over the line.
With ten minutes remaining, Cormac Morgan played a precise through ball to O’Reilly to run onto and outfox the Sirocco goalie before planting the ball in the net for another treble.
Despite it being a case of Sirocco not taking their chances when they came along in the first half, St Mary’s were delighted to come away with the win and a clean sheet. The other teams can expect to encounter plenty of problems at Dixon Park in the coming weeks.
