Unbeaten league leaders Lurgan travelled to Dave Gallaher Park last weekend looking to extend their 100% winning record into the new year – but were toppled by Letterkenny.
Letterkenny 9-6 Lurgan
Lurgan were met with the best Letterkenny performance of the season.
Letterkenny’s defence was the highlight of a bruising first half and time and time again they snubbed out the well drilled Lurgan attack and in particular the bulldozing runs of big centre James Andrews and some lovely lines by full back James Patterson.
As the half wore on, the home side came more and more into it and some great work from Ryan Mortimer, Daragh Toal and Martin Molloy took them to within 5m of the opposition try line. Lurgan showed their own defensive strength and repelled the Letterkenny attack to leave the half time score 0-0.
Letterkenny started the second half as the finished the first and continued to gain a foothold in the Lurgan half. The lineout working particularly well with Mark Timoney throwing better darts than was seen all week at Ally Pally.
Peter Scott and Dylan Gill traded a pair of penalties each to bring the score to 6-6.
The deciding act of the game came with 10 minutes to go. A Letterkenny scrum on the 22 saw Christopher Digimas, the big dairy farmer from Creeslough, milk a penalty from his opposite number.
Peter Scott duly slotted over to but Letterkenny 9-6 in front.
The Letterkenny defence held firm to close out the remaining time on the clock, in particular army man Bryan McGinley and if the rest of his colleagues in Finner Camp defend as well as he does then we can rest assured the security of our country is in good hands!
The Letterkenny team will hope to build on this fantastic performance and hopefully put a run of wins together starting with the visit of Hollywood RFC on Jan 13.
Letterkenny: David Ward, Mark Timoney, Christopher Digimas, Michael Grant, Christopher Green, Gary Canning, Michael Foy, Conor Dunleavy, Dillon Doherty, Ryan Mortimer, Martin Molloy, Peter Scott, Bryan McGinley, Daragh Toal, Daragh Turley. Replacements: Oisin Toal, Ray Gallagher
Lurgan: Graham Currie, Louis Lawson, Josh Lyness, Richard Shillday, Dan Lyness, Lee Allen, Ryan Osbourne, Dean Wilson, Chris Jenks, Dylan Gill, Richard Hull, James Andrews, Jamie Clarke, Ryan Mooney, James Patterson. Replacements: Ryan Emerson, Des Bingham
