The Dalata Hotel Group Connacht U20 Football Championship continued on Wednesday evening. Photo by Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile
Dalata Hotel Group Connacht U-20 Football Championship Round Two
Mayo 2-18 (2-3-12) Galway 3-13 (3-2-9)
Roscommon 1-16 (1-1-14) Sligo 0-10 (0-0-10)
The meeting of the two finalists in the 2022 All-Ireland minor football championship looked like the game of the day in what was a busy evening for the Dalata Hotel Group U-20 championship,and the footballers of Galway and Mayo didn’t disappoint as they produced a thriller in Tuam Stadium, eventually decided by a two-pointer from Darragh Beirne with a couple of minutes to play.
While there was never a stage when either side looked like they had too strong of a grip of the tie, this was still a contest where both counties had clear periods of supremacy.
Éanna Monaghan’s goal was the crucial score of the opening quarter, after which Galway held a 1-5 to 0-3 lead, playing with a slight breeze. Mayo’s second quarter saw them play some of their best football of the game, however, scoring 1-6 without reply at one stage. Josh Carey’s goal briefly put them four points clear, but a two-pointer from Colm Costello left the tie in the balance.
Oliver Armstrong and Seamus Howard were impressive at midfield to give the Mayo attack a steady stream of possession and the direct running of Hugh O’Loughlin and Cian McHale from the half-back line was also a crucial ingredient, but Galway’s keen eye for a score, led by Costello at full forward, who scored 1-7, kept them in the game.
He rifled the ball into the rook of the net in another run of 1-4 unanswered, this time from the Tribesmen, while a fantastic save from Kyle Gilmore to deny Tom Lydon a goal looked like a crucial play in the game’s story.
After digging deep to draw level, Galway substitute Ryan O’Donnell scored his team’s third goal to once again establish a three point lead but Mayo responded in kind with a Tomy Lydon penalty, bringing The Neale man’s tally to 1-9 for the night, and that set the stage for Beirne to deliver his towering kick to win the game, less than two weeks after he experienced a gut-wrenching defeat in Croke Park as part of the St. Colman’s side that lost the Hogan Cup final.
Roscommon got their campaign off the mark in front of their own supporters at King & Moffatt Dr. Hyde Park with an impressive win over Sligo, hitting the front through a well-taken John Curran goal in the fifth minute and never trailing from then on.
Daniel Hagney hit the game’s only two-pointer to stretch the lead but the tie was still in the balance at half-time, with Sligo playing some of their best football in the closing stages of the opening half-hour. Ronan Niland split the posts for the best score of a run of three in a row to make it 1-6 to 0-6 at the interval, but they couldn’t carry that momentum into the second half as Roscommon hit the first four after the restart, with Curran and David Higgins impressing with elegant kicks from close to the edge of the arc.
Sligo rallied again to pull back to within four points, but Roscommon had the sharper kick in the end with Higgins, Curran, John McGuinness, Ruairi Kilcline, Rory Carthy and Eoin Collins all on target to stretch out the lead and give the Rossies their first win of the campaign, and a big boost going into their ‘bye’ week.
