Letterkenny 13 : 28 Grosvenor (Belfast)

Letterkenny’s unbeaten home record for the season disappeared and any chance of the league with this defeat to league leaders Grosvenor at Dave Gallaher Park. Grosvenor, unbeaten this season and having run up some big winning margins, fully justified their reputation with a very balanced team of big ball carrying forwards and speedy backs and only some excellent displays by some of the home side prevented a big points total against them.

The visitors completely dominated the set scrums and had a sizeable advantage out of touch so Letterkenny spent most of the game tackling and counter rucking. That they did win possession was a tribute to some courageous work around the field and while at the end defeat was their lot they will have learned some useful lessons from the encounter.

A litany of embarrassing attempts at tackling led to Grosvenor’s opening try after seven minutes but Letterkenny captain Adam Moore equalised with an individual effort on the twelve minute mark when he blocked down an attempted clearance by the visitors out half on his twenty two and followed up the loose ball to score out on the left to bring the scores level at five all. Four minutes on the pressure from the ball carrying of the Grosvenor forwards saw their big pack take the play ten metres from the Letterkenny line for the left winger to cross for a try.  Letterkenny got back into the game with a solid lineout take from Moore and ruck created on the visitor’s ten meter line from a penalty award to the home side. Boyd Robinson’s strike from out on the right was straight and true to bring the score to ten to eight. But that was as good as it got and with Letterkenny now having difficulty getting any possession they spent the twelve up to half time defending a succession of scrums and penalties inside their own twenty two. Some heroic work held out wave after wave of attack from the visitors but just when they thought they had weathered the storm, in fact four minutes into injury time, the big Grosvenor number five got in for a try.

A half time score of fifteen points to eight considering possession and play in the first  half left Letterkenny still very much in the game but three minutes into the half they gave away three points to a penalty followed by another ten minutes later and at twenty one to eight . Letterkenny in fact played well in the final fifteen minutes and did not deserve the bad luck of a converted try four minutes from the end. The home side responded well and some good mauling on the half way line brought a penalty with the resulting touch throw finding Moore in the middle of the line. A well organised maul saw the Letterkenny side over the line where hooker Martin Bond touched town on the second minute of injury time.

Good displays from scrum half Damien Williamson, Jamie Boyle at flanker, Sean Dunleavy and John Anderson and team captain Adam Moore. A very encouraging return for hooker Martin Bond who showed that he still a good appetite for game and  his ‘ street knowledge’ in tight exchanges will prove invaluable in the coming games.

The fifteen points losing margin should give the Letterkenny mentors food for thought but their display of grit and determination in that second half particularly will give them a foundation to work on and with players to return to the side they will be looking forward to that visit from Monaghan in the quarter final of the Gordon West cup next Saturday.

TEAM

Rory Mc Gonagle, Martin Bond, Ray Clarke, Sean Dunleavy, John Anderson, Brendan Smith, Jamie Boyle , Adam Moore ( captain) Damien Williamson, Boyd Robinson, Andrew Gibson, Brian Peoples, John Anthony Mc Fadden, Tony Mc Bride, Kyle Samson.