Terence Shiels is congratulated by his team-mates after he scored the winner. Pic by Northwest Newspix.
CUP DRAW HANDS A MIXED BAG TO DONEGAL CLUBS:
It’s likely that Finn Harps boss, Ollie Horgan, and his counterpart at Letterkenny Rovers, Eamon McConigley,will be in a position to exchange information on their respective opponents in the second round of the F.AI. Cup.
Yesterday evening’s draw saw Harps first out of the drum with a home game against Leinster League outfit, Crumlin United, Rovers’ opponents in the F.A.I. Intermediate Cup Final at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday May 14th.
And the Letterkenny’s side reward for that dramatic late win over Portmarnock on Sunday is an away trip to Athlone to face a League of Ireland First Division team Horgan will know all about from recent seasons sharing the Division with them. Not that I strongly suspect both managers won’t be doing their own homework on their opponents before those Cup games on the weekend ending May 22nd.
Rovers got there thanks to an industrious if hardly spectacular win over Portmarnock at Leckview. In a game that never had the nerve driven atmosphere – or indeed the attendance – that marked the previous week’s Intermediate Cup success over Ringmahon Rangers, this was nevertheless a well earned outcome, Terence Shields, more than making up for a first half error that led to the Cork side’s equalizer, by firing low into the corner of the net from a free-kick awarded – harshly I thought – on the edge of the box.
With only a couple of minutes to go at that stage, Portmarnock rallied for another leveller but found a sturdy back-line, fronted by an equally determined midfield, in their way.
Christy Conaghan had given the home side the lead inside the opening ten minutes but the Dubliners were back in the game soon afterwards when the otherwise excellent, Rory Kelly, give away a penalty duly converted by Ross Moran.
From then on, it was a hard slog with both teams contributing to a competitive and edgy ninety minutes until coming close to the last of those minutes, Shields struck the winner and headed for the corner flag to celebrate with his team-mates.
They’ll head for the Athlone Town Stadium at Lissywoollen on the weekend of the 20th-22nd of May and can be genuinely hopeful of at least taking the LO.I. team to a replay though from here on in, that hope will have retreated to the back of minds as the more illustrious venue of the Aviva Stadium awaits the Letterkenny side.
Tickets went on sale yesterday and sale is the appropriate term given that they only cost 10 euro – under-16’s free – and that can also allow you watch Pike Rovers and Sheriff YC in the F.A.I. Junior Cup Final, the curtain raiser to the real action of the day.
HARPS NEED TO STRIKE IN TRANSFER WINDOW:
No great surprise that Finn Harps returned from Cork with a big fat zero where a point or three might have been. Though if you were checking in for the result and match report in this neck of the woods last Friday night you might have been surprised to view the headline: “Harps Suffer Heavy Away Defeat in Cork.”
Heavy? 3-1? Five, six or seven nil, now THAT’S heavy, but Ollie Horgan’s men, even if the concession of two early goals at Turner’s Cross might have had the threat of an avalanche about it, weren’t completely overawed.
Points away from home are going to be hard sought but Harps will need to pick up a few on their travels, not least this coming Friday night when they face into another long trek – note to ‘Soccer Republic’ pundits, these really are lengthy excursions in League of Ireland terms – this time to Wexford.
The First Division champions of 2015 haven’t been playing badly but results have not been going their way and they’ll be, perhaps not even quietly, fancying their chances against Harps on Friday night.
Shank Keegan’s men suffered a 2-0 home reversal last weekend against a Galway United side that Harps ran close in both recent league and E.A. Sports Cup encounters but they’ll believe they can take all three points when the latter come to town.
Those defeats against Dundalk and Cork aside, Horgan’s men have proved more than a match for all their opponents this season and will go to Ferrycarrig Park confident that they can claim a positive result.
Ryan Curran grabbed his third goal of the season in the defeat in Cork and he and Dave Scully now share five between on the scoring charts. How Harps could do with a younger Kevin McHugh and a guarantee of goals. The veteran version is still capable of finding the net but will, no doubt, be starting most games on the bench barring injury to the recognised front two.
Come the transfer window in July, such a striker is bound to be on Ollie Horgan’s shopping list but quality costs and persuading a Christy Fagan, Ciaran Kilduff or Danny Furlong to switch to the North-West might be beyond the powers of even the Harps manager.
Meanwhile, the immediate fixture list for Harps isn’t showing any signs of getting easier – after the trip to Wexford, the Donegal side face Bohemians at home, Derry City away, Dundalk (home) and Shamrock Rovers away before facing Sligo Rovers in Ballybofey.
That line-up of testing games does make it imperative that Harps pick up something this weekend though they will be minus the services of Scully who is suspended and quite likely one or all of the injured trio of Raymond Foy, Adam Hanlon and goalkeeper, Richard Brush.
Should the latter miss out, there is always the reliable Ciaran Gallagher to call upon as indeed he was at Turner’s Cross when that injury swept Brush out of the action.
Ten points is a decent return from Harps opening matches but from here on in is where it gets really tricky starting in Wexford on Friday night.
WHEN TRAGEDY CRUSHED THE HEART OUT OF FOOTBALL:
Hillsborough. It should be the name of a football stadium where Sheffield Wednesday play their home games and where, once upon a time, it hosted F.A. Cup semi-finals before Wembley became the chosen venue.
It should be the venue where Wednesday and Cardiff City do battle on Saturday next bidding to make it into the Championship play-offs. It is that, of course, and the respective sets of fans will duly gather to will their teams on in the famous old ground.
But it must forever more bear the shadow of one of football’s most tragic episodes – the loss of 96 lives and the crushing injuries to hundreds more on that fateful day back on April 15th, 1989.
Yesterday, a jury – following inquests that lasted two years but in cold reality were much longer than that – found the Liverpool supporters, crushed to oblivion at the Leppings Lane end of the ground, had been “unlawfully killed” and declared the match commander Chief Superintendent, David Duckenfield. “responsible for manslaughter by gross negligence.”
Not just the footballing world was touched and horrified by the plight of those fans both at the time and since but football, along with the bereaved families and friends, was undoubtedly the loser.
The police chief or his team could never escape that verdict even if it was a long time coming.
But how many more members of authorities patrolling big games got away with it? Which of us old enough to recall will ever forget the chaotic scenes at Dalymount Park, Dublin, on a February night back in 1985 when Ireland faced Italy in a friendly. In a ground with a capacity for 25,000, around 40,000 fans crammed – close to crushed – into the ground with some supporters occupying vantage points on the roof of the then crumbling stadium.
Truly a recipe for “unlawful killing” but somehow those who allowed such a situation develop escaped with their own reputations intact and the hugely fortunate loss of no lives or serious injury.
Football and those responsible for staging big matches has, thankfully, changed and all-seater stadiums are now the norm rather than the exception.
But Hillsborough has never been, and never will be, the same again.
RAVENHILL ON THE RADAR:
Mark this one down in your diary you members of the sporting population of Letterkenny. Saturday May 7th, Ravenhill. Or the Kingspan Stadium as sponsorship now deems we call it.
After having just missed out in the league final last month when Armagh emerged victorious – thanks in no small measure to some debatable decisions from officialdom both on and off the pitch – the Letterkenny R.F.C. under-18’s will face the same opposition (hopefully this time just the team) at the Belfast venue for the right to take home the Ulster Cup.
Another outstanding performance saw them overcome Virginia in the semi-final at Dave Gallaher Park on Saturday and book the buses for Belfast.
The Cavan team were, it has to be stressed, no pushovers but this young Letterkenny side boast tenacity and vibrancy and the 22-10 win was deserved right from the moment Matthew Faulkner went over for the opening score.
The visitors did draw level and the nerves were evident in both ranks as the teams finished the first half on equal terms.
But with Peter Scott finding his kicking boots in the second period and his side moving up a gear there was to be more rewards through a penalty try and a Daniel Faulkner five pointer to put Ravenhill on the radar. But not before Virginia scored a late and well-earned consolation.
This isn’t just a team effort – the entire squad play a significant part and, apart from the officials on the sidelines, the substitutes were never found wanting in helping the side over the line.
Next, and final stop, the Kingspan Stadium.
PARNELL PARK BOUND:
Not the only Donegal semi-final success story against Cavan opposition at the weekend. The Donegal women’s team also secured a final berth – beating their rivals 0-13 to 0-6 to secure a place in the ultimate round of the LIDL Ladies National League Division 2.
Another impressive display from Michael Naughton’s team and it doesn’t take much guessing to figure out who notched eight of her side’s points.
Yet another date for the diary – Parnell Park on May 6th where Westmeath will provide the second finalist. And hopefully second after the final whistle as well.
INDIAN SIGNS:
In the mists that cloud this old head, I may have heard this one somewhere before but thanks to a well placed source – well placed at my lunch table yesterday – here is a G.A.A. anecdote worth the repeating.
It was MacCumhaill Park. Donegal against Armagh in what competition I didn’t ask but sometime in the seventies.
All that can be said for certain is that big Martin Griffin – the man who put Ball into Ballybofey – was getting a bit of a runaround in the opening half.
But when he emerged for the second period, he was a changed man. A coat of war paint on; a bandana around his head; and a feather emerging up through it. And some words of warning to his marker whose name escapes me but who didn’t do much escaping from the Mighty Martin in that second half.
We were talking at lunch about how the games of Gaelic football, soccer and rugby, don’t have the characters of old anymore. And among the names that popped up to prove the point, Griffin was one.
A member, of course, of Donegal’s ’74 Ulster Championship winning team – another feather in his cap.
ANDY MUM’S VISITS CROKER:
A tweet on Sunday’s big game at Croker: “82k crowd at Croke Park for All-Ireland gaelic football league final Dublin V Kerry. All amateurs. Huge skill level. Gr8 family day out.”
The tweeter? None other than Judy Murray, better known as mother of one of the world’s best tennis players.
Her first experience of a Gaelic Football encounter and she went even went on to pick out Colm ‘The Gooch’ Cooper as her man of the match.
It’s only when someone from outside the country gets a chance to watch at first hand our national sport that we realise just what a gem we have in terms of a sporting spectacle. And, as Andy’s mum pointed out, all of them amateur.
THE (T)RUM(P)BELOWS CUP:
And another story of a personality involved in a sporting event far removed from their own world view as recalled in one of the weekend papers.
It’s the ‘Saint & Greavsie’ show on I.T.V. during the 1991/92 season and the draw for the quarter-finals of the Rumbelows Cup (otherwise known as the League Cup) is being staged.
The show is not actually taking place in London as the hosts, Ian and Jimmy, are in the U.S.A. doing a documentary on how the country is preparing for the 1994 World Cup Finals.
One man gets the opportunity to draw two of the balls out of the drum. And as a result Peterborough United are lined up to play Middlesbrough. And the personality chosen to do the honours? One (and there’s only one) Donald Trump! The Posh, incidentally, drew 0-0 against the ‘Boro before losing by the only goal in the replay.
Trump, meanwhile, looks like he’ll be drawn to face Hilary Clinton in the ultimate round of the U.S. Presidential elections.
N-W 10K TIME AGAIN:
The annual North-West 10k is running its 20th staging this weekend and is certain to attract another huge participation.
The local charities of Donegal Spina Bifida and the Irish Pilgrimage Trust will benefit from this year’s event so it’s not just your own physical well-being you’re boosting by taking part.
Runners and walkers will start off at 2.p.m. and finish at God knows what time. But if you come in after midnight you’ll still be a winner.
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