As reported in last month’s up-date, our Junior B footballers also started their 2005 Championship season successfully with a win over pre-championship favourites Ballinure. This set them up for a second round tie against Passage – the third meeting of these clubs in 2005 Championship action as along with the above-reported A game, our Under 21 footballers also had defeated the sea-side club earlier in the year.
The Passage lads were well up for this clash and started the better side. Aided by a strong breeze and the forceful play of their evergreen midfielder Seamus Flynn, Passage dictated matters early on. Only for some excellent goalkeeping from custodian Aidan Harte, White’s Cross could have been in dire trouble early on. Our cause was not helped by the loss of fullback and captain Robert O Brien after just fifteen minutes of action as Passage raced into a three point lead. However Robert’s replacement Barry Linehan slowly began to exert his presence on the game and along with the growing influence of the Kelleher cousins Con and Martin, White’s Cross began to compete more vigorously. However we were not able to make this pay on the score-board and trailed 0-4 to 0-1 at the short-whistle, with a pointed free from Colm Sheahan being our sole score.
Wing-forward Eoghan Kelleher was replaced with Alan O Herlihy at the break, as Kelleher suffered a recurrence of a hamstring injury. With the aid of the strong wind our lads set about the task at hand and the score of the night from Con Kelleher, was sandwiched by two fine O’ Herlihy scores, whose pace was causing havoc in the Passage defence. However Passage responded with two points from centre-forward Seamus Forde to lead by 0-6 to 0-4 after 48 minutes.
White’s Cross added further pace to their attack with the introduction of Brian O Sullivan and he created two great goal chances both of which went narrowly wide. However on 52 minutes Pat Hennessy, now operating at full-forward, saw his shot dip into the top corner of Kevin Mullane’s goal to give White’s Cross the lead for the first time.
The final minutes were played out at a frenetic pace, but stout defending by Linehan, Sean Gorman, Padraig Murnane and Donal Kelly saw White’s Cross victorious. This sets this side up for a Quarter-Final clash with Nemo Rangers, on May 29th, the result of which is unknown at the time of print.
Team: Aidan Harte, Sean Gorman, Robert O Brien, Padraig Murnane, Roy O Driscoll, Donal Kelly, William Casey, Martin Kelleher, Con Kelleher (0-1), Eoghan Kelleher, Pat Hennessy (1-1), Colm Sheahan (0-1), Alfie McEvoy, Philip O Connell (0-1), Colin Lawless.
Subs Used: Barry Linehan for O’ Brien (inj.); Alan O Herlihy (0-2) for E Kelleher (inj,); Brian O Sullivan for McEvoy; Victor O Sullivan for Casey.