We played Newcastle West in the third and final game of the football championship in Knockaderry on Friday night. A key game, with the winner going directly to the West final, everyone was expecting a good game. On a night for the ducks, conditions were difficult for both teams as the ball handling was extremely difficult, but both teams tried hard.
With the aid of the wind we started very promising and dominated possession for the first quarter. Our backs and midfield were in control and held the Newcastle West attacks comfortably. We were struggling to create clear scoring chances and so the scoreboard remained bare for some time. Eventually we found our scoring range and tacked on a few nice points. With a couple of minutes to go in the half we had a hard earned 3 point advantage. However, Newcastle West then struck for a goal which tied the game at half time on a score of Monagea 0-4 Newcastle West 1-1.
The third quarter was dominated by Newcastle West, who backed by the wind dominated the play and created some good opportunities. We also contributed to our downfall in this quarter by giving away possession in key areas of the field and gave up some soft goals. The net result was that Newcastle West struck four goals in this period and the game was effectively over. To our credit we persisted and over the remaining quarter, we dominated the play and scored six points. The final score was Monagea 0-10 Newcastle West 5-3. Overall it was a strange game with Monagea having a large share of the possession but Newcastle West getting the vital big scores and on that basis, Newcastle West more than deserved their win.
We now play Fr. Caseys in the semi-final of the West championship. After our narrow one point win over them in the second round, they will be gunning for revenge and a tough battle is to be expected.
