Newmarket-on-Fergus 1-11
Tubber 1-09
Venue: Tubber
Although they were in complete control for large spells, Newmarket-on-Fergus were made sweat for their victory over Tubber on Friday evening which sees them register their first points on the board of the Division 4 League table.
It was the ideal start for Newmarket as Eoin McInerney caught the sliotar over the head of former Clare forward Eamon Taaffe and passed to wing-back Pa Duggan, his clearance found Ger Hannon who shimmied past the Tubber defenders before flicking the ball to the back of the net with the contest a mere two minutes old.
Tubber then opened their account but Newmarket replied with seven points on the bounce as they exerted their dominance with the recently regraded Brian Clancy among the scorers along with captain for the encounter, Malachy Noonan. The North Clare side narrowed the deficit to seven points at the sounding of Martin Leahy’s half-time whistle.
Conor Clancy hits the deck, foul angers our forwards, Tubber keeper responds “what do ye want, two frees”? #JuniorB #GAA
— Newmarket GAA (@NOFGAA) April 14, 2017
The hosts were quickest out of the blocks and missed several scoring opportunities but amongst their misses hit two points to chip away at the lead. That coupled with a 65 from David O’Donoghue that went all the way to the back of the net ensured the four Newmarket supporters plus Tubber’s following of a dozen were to see a more evenly matched final twenty minutes.
Noonan hit the Blues’ first score of the second half on thirty nine minutes but it was cancelled out by a Taaffe white flag. A twenty one metre free was awarded to the visitors in the next attack, a point would have sufficed to boost their lead but Ger Hannon unsuccessfully attempted to collect his second goal, luckily him the rebound stayed in the Newmarket attack and Clancy split the posts. The sides exchanged scores for a final time to leave a gap of two points between them as the game concluded.
Eoin McInerney was the standout player of the year while his full-back colleagues Brendan Mullins and Ronan McCarthy ran a tight ship at the back. As ever, manager John Hannon was able to spring plenty of players from the bench, among those were the returning Niall Garry and Dylan Howard who made his Junior debut.
Their next outing is on April 30th where they host Feakle, the team that defeated them in the 2015 Division 5 League Final and also knocked them out of the championship in the same year. For that game, management will be hoping to have more players at their disposal, they will be keen to see a further improvement between now and then and also for centre-forward Peter Roche to find some club togs and socks in the interval.
Newmarket-on-Fergus: Conor McCarthy; Brendan Mullins, Eoin McInerney, Ronan McCarthy; Pa Duggan, Pakie McCormack, Pa Burke; Davy McCormack (0-01), Malachy Noonan (0-03 1’65); Liam Harkin, Peter Roche (0-02), Ger Hannon (1-01); Brian Clancy (0-03), Conor Clancy, Oisin Pender (0-01). Subs: Niall Garry for C Clancy (33), Eoin Frawley for Harkin (38), Fergal McInerney for Roche (38), Dylan Howard for Mullins (56)