TRINITY WIN IN FIRST ROUND OF ALL IRELAND CUP!!
08/10/2007

Sundays Well 17pts Trinity 23 pts 

After five days in England on tour, the travel weary Trinity senior squad had to drag themselves down to Cork to play the first round of the All Ireland cup – a game that was scheduled to have been played last Saturday. This new look competition features all 48 senior teams of the All Ireland league. The second and third Division teams play off in the first round with the first division teams coming into the second round draw. Trinity now play Clonakilty in College park on Saturday in the second round.

On a wet Monday night in Musgrave park and playing only two days after the game against Oxford University this was always going to be a character test for the students, and they may have been forgiven if they lost. But this team clearly has more resolve and grit than most.

Sundays Well came out fired up and keen to take it to the students from Dublin. This they did to good effect and they were awarded a penalty early on which they kicked. Not surprisingly Trinity looked flat in the first half and spent most of this period defending. The students did manage to kick a penalty through out half Johnny Watt midway through the half. Sundays Well scored a try after several phases in the Trinity 22.

Johnny Watt came back to kick another penalty to close the score to 10-6. Trinity then dug deep and managed to get some continuity in the slippery conditions which resulted in hooker Ben Cunningham celebrating his birthday diving over by the posts. Trinity led 13-10 at half time.

In the second half Trinity faced the breeze and rain, but stepped their game up a couple of levels and began to dominate possession and territory. They went close on a couple of occasions with wing Shane Hanratty losing the ball over the line after a great cross kick from Johnny Watt. Hanratty also made several strong runs was always dangerous on the ball.

Eventually Trinity got the vital try and conversion to put them two scores ahead. Second row Paddy Earls on his 1st XV debut scoring a good try from close in. This was followed by Johnny Watt kicking another penalty 23 -10 Trinity.

With six minutes to go Sundays Well broke through to score a try and this woke them up into a last gasp effort, Trinity had to face the last few minutes under siege.

This was n significant win for the Trinity team under huge adversity. If the Team have any pretensions to go far this season, its games like these deep in the heart of Munster on a wet miserable Monday night, that have to be won. Hopefully the last seven days will stand to this close knit squad.

Team; 15 Andy Wallace (Richard Brady 68), 14 Shane Hanratty, 13 Volney Rouse,12 Eddie Hamilton, 11 Gareth Murphy (Colin Murphy 20), 10 Johnny Watt, 9 Bryan Johnson, 1 Graham Murphy (Tristan Goodbody 50), 2 Ben Cunningham, 3 Eoin O’Cuilleanean (James Gethings 65), 4 Ciaran Condren, 5 Paddy Earls, 6 Shane Young, 7 Mark Lynch, 8 Richard Morrow (Alan Mathews 25).

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