30 Mar Match Reports – 19/03/22
Lurgan Town 1 – 1 Cookstown Youth
A Friday night visit to the Lurgan Town Arena was next up for the Cookstown Youth lads, hoping to bounce back after exiting Knockout Cup via penalties the week before. They got off to the best possible start going a goal up within the first few minutes. Great work from Corrigan, who led the line brilliantly, saw him hold off his marker before squaring the ball to Davidson who’s first time strike from range caught Lurgan Town’s keeper off guard. Cookstown started to get on the ball even more and dictating the play through the midfield trio of Davidson, Conway and Martin. On two or three occasions Corrigan was slipped in but only for last ditch defending or the onrushing keeper it could have been 2 or 3 nil. Equaliser came few minutes before half time, great finish from Lurgan’s midfielder but he was afforded far too much time to pick his spot with little pressure put on him.
Second half saw Lurgan come out a lot stronger and the Cookstown boys seemed to back off and drop deeper towards their own goal, inviting Lurgan on. Lurgan Town thought they had the winner in the dying minutes, the keeper was beat and looked to be a simple tap in but Loughran came out of nowhere with a great goal line clearance to ensure their unbeaten streak continued. Backs to the wall at times for the Cookstown boys but they hung in for the draw.
CYFC u14’s 2-0 Ridgeway Rovers
Last Saturday the 2008’s faced league leaders Ridgeway Rovers in NIBFA NL First Division at Beechway.
The Belfast boys rocked up in their final game of the season with the expectation of an easy win, but the young sizzlers had other ideas. The Blues flew out of the traps and into the lead on 3 minutes when Brendan Mulgrew latched unto a superb McElhatton cross at the back post to go 1-0 up. Two minutes later McElhatton nearly doubled the lead with a shot just wide after good work between James Mulgrew and Donnelly. Donnelly then saw a free kick bounce off a Ridgeway defender on the wall before Kelso forced a save with a header from 12 yards on the half hour mark. McCrory made a superb goal line clearance with a succession of Ridgeway corners on 25 minutes. A great free kick from captain McKenzie was then met by the head of Russo at the back post to double Cookstown’s lead just before halftime in a superb opening 35 minutes by the homesters.
James Mulgrew danced through three Ridgeway defenders before blasting over the bar on the edge of the box on 38 minutes as Cookstown tried to kill the game off. Patterson then made a couple of great saves and interceptions with the back four of Russo, McKenzie, Irwin and Price remaining steadfast. Kelso, Talbot and McElhatton all had good chances to wrap the game up before Patterson made another fine save at the death as the Cookstown lads deservedly collected all three points and an impressive clean sheet.
TEAM:- B. Patterson, G. Russo, H. Mckenzie, E. Irwin, J. Price, A. McElhatton, J. Mulgrew, J. Donnelly, B. Mulgrew, C. McCrory, I. Kelso, C. Talbot.