Sharp Swords slices through Suncroft
Suncroft's Jack Doyle gives chase as Caragh's Darragh Swords is on the ball Photo: Sean Brilly
A slick second half performance saw Caragh overcome Suncroft in the opening round of Group D of the Auld Shebeen Athy Intermediate Football Championship played in an autumn deluge at Manguard Park on Thursday night.
Ahead by only two points at the break, Caragh finished the game off as a contest in the third quarter and restricted their opponents to a couple of late points in the second half.
The winners had the greater firepower, with Darragh Swords and Eoghan O’Haire sharing eleven points between them while Suncroft’s go-to men Eoghan Lawless and Fionn Dowling shared their six points but struggled to shake off the close attentions of Ryan Burke and Matthew McNally in the Caragh rearguard.
Caragh led 0-5 to 0-1 after the opening quarter with Swords responsible for three sweetly struck points but Suncroft hit back with three points from Dowling in the second quarter, including a magnificent free into the wind from close to the sideline.
Half-Time: Caragh 0-6 Suncroft 0-4.
Swords opened the second half with another superb effort from 40 metres before Burke split the posts from a similar distance and the impressive O’Haire made it 0-9 to 0-4 after 41 minutes.
That gave Suncroft a mountain to climb and they never really looked like doing so, despite working hard all through.
Swords and O’Haire added another point each to stretch the lead to seven points and with the game petering out O’Haire followed up again with his fifth point after Dan Campbell had thundered an effort off the crossbar.
Swords added his sixth point from a free before Suncroft flashed over two consolation scores from a Dowling free and a Lawless effort from play with substitute Fergal McKennedy’s injury time score rounding off an eight-point win for Caragh.
Michael Behan; Cathal McKennedy, Matthew McNally, Billy Byrne; Cian Burke, Ryan Burke 0-1, Dan Murray; Paul Dockery, Dan Lynam 0-1; Dan Campbell, Darragh Swords 0-6 (2fs,1’45), Josh Gannon; Kevin Campbell, Eoghan O’Haire 0-5 (2fs), Conor Sullivan. SUBS: Austin Nevin for Sullivan HT, Fergal McKennedy 0-1 for D Campbell 53.
David Sutton; Jack Setright, Sean Browne, Harry Dillon; Mikey Troy, Conor Smyth, Sam Murphy; Conn Kehoe, Mark Brown; Jack Doyle, Eoghan Lawless 0-2, Senan Brannock; Chris Phillips, Fionn Dowling 0-4 (3fs,1m), Mark Browne. SUBS: Tom Martin for Brown 39, Diarmuid Enright for Murphy 44, Darragh Malone for Brannock 44.
Billy O’Connell
