BUCCANEERS SECONDS 17 UNIVERSITY OF GALWAY 52
BUCCANEERS SECONDS, despite opening the scoring, could not match the pace and energy of University of Galway when they succumbed to a 52-17 defeat in the quarter-final of the Bank of Ireland Connacht Junior Plate at Dubarry Park on Sunday. There was a bite in the air on a dry afternoon when the Students proved too hot to handle for the hosts.
Buccs got off to a promising start with Thomas McGann darting through for a 5th minute try. College responded with a trio of tries in a twelve minutes’ scoring burst between the 10th and 21st minutes when the homesters could not cope with the pace of their backs with touchdowns by Daniel Bent, Rex Aghabueze and Cian Cleary. Brian Bergin helped himself to their fourth try before Joaquin del Olmo forced his way over for a home try converted by Ger Fallon which left Buccaneers trailing 26-12 at halftime.
Fallon was sin-binned five minutes into the second half for an untidy tackle and College promptly capitalised with Callum Wall getting over the home line following a tapped penalty. A missed tackle before the hour mark resulted in Bent’s second try for the Students and shortly afterwards Sean Crowley’s sidestep saw him get on the scoresheet.
Oisin Donoghue was up in support after Conor Morrissey’s swiftly tapped penalty to score Buccaneers third try with 12 minutes remaining. But the visitors had the final say when Wall scored his second try. Cleary had a 75% success rate with his conversions which helped University of Galway to their 52-17 victory, thus atoning for their recent crunch league defeat to the Pirates.
BUCCANEERS:- T.McGann; R.Greene, L.Balsiger, J.del Olmo, J.Rosney; G.Fallon, C.Rooney-Digan; O.Donoghue, C.Morrissey, A.Oates; F.McDonnell, L.Giles; C.Brill, G.Catarino and J.Brady. Replacments:- S.Fogarty (for Morrissey, h/t), D.Martin (for Balsiger, h/t), K.Grehan (for Donoghue, h/t), C.Morrissey (for Brady, 53 mins), O.Donoghue (for Fogarty, 56 mins), J.Scouler (for Goncalo, 63 mins), S.Fogarty (for Oates, inj. 73 mins) and S.Flynn.
UNIVERSITY OF GALWAY:- C.Cleary; R. Aghabueze, D.Bent, H.Guest, E.Cullen; B.Clarke, B.Bergin; L.Melia, O.Soden, C.Wall; T.McCabe, F.O’Connor; P.Magliocco, S.McDonnell and S.Devlin. Replacements used:- M.O’Griofa, L.Jones, A.O’Halloran, S.Crowley and N.O’Malley.
Referee:- David Burke (Connacht).
