It was the 5th of November and St Joe’s were facing St Coleman’s from Macroom in the Allianz Sciath na Scol final. Both teams had been doing their best to this point, as St Joe’s beat Ballygarvan NS by 18 points and St Coleman’s beat St Columba’s by 5 points.
There was a great buzz in the stadium for the pre match parade, and both sets of fans were excellent across the whole match. The coaches gave their final instructions.
After that, the ref threw the O’Neill’s ball into the air and the game was on. St Coleman’s couldn’t have got off to a better start as their forwards kicked over two early points. But St joseph’s were quick to respond. Their shot that hit the crossbar, with our full forward the first to react as he palmed the ball into the back of the net after 4 minutes.
St Joseph’s would carry one their impressive form as their corner forward scoring his first goal for St Joseph’s to put them up by 4 points. St Joseph’s followed up with three points in quick succession from three different scorers. Our centre forward pounced on a breaking ball and poked it in under the keeper’s arm, The goalie followed this disappointment by making a crucial save, throwing himself at wonder strike by Joe’s wing-forward and anther stop, one on one with the full forward.
St Colman’s would come close to scoring a goal but St Joseph’s captain made brilliant block to force a point.
Then Joe’s centre forward got his second point from long range. Our full forward got his second goal as he tapped the ball over the keeper’s head follow a great ball by the centre forward.
St Joseph’s centre back popped up to score a superb point before our full forward completed his hat-trick as our midfield hand passed the ball across the goal for him to slap into the net.
Joe’s wing forwards scored a second point before St Coleman’s rallied. They scored a point an came agonisingly close to a goal, hitting the side netting.
Our other corer forward would get Joe’s 5th goal of the afternoon, Joe’s struck the crossbar from distance and he got the ball and shot it with power into the roof of the net.
The centre forward would keep up his impressive performance, as he kicked over another point, so the referee would blow his whistle for half time with the score 5:7 to 0:4, in St Joseph’s favour.
2nd Half
The second half got under way as Joe’s keeper was called into action, claiming a looping high ball. St Coleman’s came close to getting a goal as they played a great ball across, only for the keeper to come off his line and slow down the attack.
St Colman’s scored a point, followed by a superb strike for their first goal of the match and another point from close range. St Colman’s had a goal disallowed, with the referee bringing it back because the free was taken too quickly.
With te minutes to go, a St Joseph’s substitute score the point of the match and another from a starting forward forward, either side of a well struck point from our centre back.
St Coleman’s scored a point and hit the post before the referee blew the full time whistle, with a final score of 7:9 to 1:8.
St Coleman’s were a solid team, but St Joseph’s had played very well.
A few minutes later, St Joseph’s players and assistant manager lifted the trophy. It was a fantastic performance from every player and we were delighted with how great our supporters were.
SP reporting
