Samphires 2 Abbeydorney 2 – We played Abbeydorney in the U17 league last Saturday in an extremely cold, wet and windy Fenit.The players are to be complimented on their efforts on the day. Our squad was a small bit depleted but they all gave their all and in the end were a bit unlucky not to have come away with all 3 points. The first half was even enough with our opponents who were physically bigger imposing themselves early to create a number of half chances but Eoghan O’Brien in goals and his defence of Padraig O’Connor, Antoin Stanton, Jack McCarthy and Jamie Hogan were unyielding and kept them out. We then got a foothold in the game when David Egan, Thomas Dwyer and Thomas Lenihan started to get on the ball in the middle and we created a few chances ourselves but our shooters didn’t have their sights recalibrated after the Christmas festivities and we shot over repeatedly. Eventually we succumbed to the sucker punch and were caught on the counter despite Eoghan’s and Jamie’s best efforts. One nil at half time. The second half followed the same pattern as the first with Abbeydorney having the better of things initially and at the end with us dominating most of the rest of it. We introduced Darragh O’Connor on the wing and Cormac O’Brien in centre back and both helped the cause greatly. With Luke Dalton making many tackles as the game got stretched we got a fair amount of good possession and Bobby O’Regan also finding his range we got in behind their defence a few times but never finished. In the end we got a piece of good luck when the opposition keeper fumbled a David Egan free and it ended up in the net. Immediately David and his namesake David Murphy combined in trademark fashion for Egan to score after a sublime 1-2. We should have put the game beyond reach at this stage but Christmas was having its affect and we somehow managed not to score. For the last 10 minutes we were under pressure and held out till injury time but conceded in the last kick of the game from a player in a seemingly offside position but the ref allowed it so it ended 2 all. Well done again to all our fellas