Our first game in the Tain Hurling league resulted in a 5-point away loss, played in windswept and rainy conditions in Newry.
Played on St Colemans’ fantastic artifical facility, we started brightly and were 4 points to the good midway throught the half with Stephen McGivern and Gerard Burns amongst our scorers. However, Shamrocks upped their efforts and with strength up the middle, they enjoyed more possession and replied with 3 points of their own, two from needless frees conceded. The next score proved crucial with a soft goal giving Shamrocks a lead they would hold on to for the rest of the game.
In the second half, a torrential downpour for a long period made the game very difficult for hurling with handling mistakes and misplaced passes from both teams as the players struggled to deal with the conditions. Scores were shared but Shamrocks then struck a few more and a second goal seemed to have made the game safe for them, leading 2-7 to 0-6.
To our credit, heads didn’t drop and we rallied to put Newry under constant pressure approaching the last dozen minutes or so. A blatant foul (can’t remember on who) which required prolonged treatment on the edge of the Shamrocks ’21 was unbelievably missed by the Tyrone whistler (the only person in the ground who didn’t see it) and during the protestations that followed, he saw fit to reduce us to 14 men with a second cautionable offence.
Points were again exchanged and with time running out, Cormac Maguire brought a fantastic save from the Newry keeper as he turned a well hit close range effort onto the post and cleared to safety. We registered two more points but time wasn’t on our side and Newry played out the last couple of minutes to take the points
