SLIGO 20 BUCCANEERS 31
Buccaneers U-15s travelled to sunlit Hamilton Park, Sligo, on Sunday for a Connacht Cup quarter-final. The home side were hot favourites to progress in this year’s Cup having beaten the midlanders in the league. After a frenetic opening period Buccs opened the scoring with a Rory Dolan penalty. Backwards and forwards went the play and it was no surprise when Sligo were 13-3 up at half-time.
Buccs restarted with a different attitude in the second half and eventually scored 27 more points to Sligo’s 7 through tries by Senan Nugent, Amoafo Brown, Darragh Glennon and Philip Finnan. Dolan landed two conversions and a penalty.
Buccaneers made elementary unforced errors which kept Sligo in the game and gave away numerous penalties for not releasing and they will need to correct these in order to fulfil their potential. However new out half Dolan has the back line ticking while lock Peter Bourke put in a big performance. Glennon was a constant threat to the Sligo line and Ciaran West and Rueben Colleran were mighty in the pack.
BUCCANEERS:- C West, D Dullea, D Cleary, A Brown, E Claffey, O McLoughlin, P Bourke, R Nagle, J Kelly, N Kelly, R Colleran, H Hannon, E O’Sullivan, O Egan, R Dolan, E Killeen, J Bourke, S Nugent, A Cotton, P Finnan and S Brett.