Galway Tribesmen 38 Athboy 26
The Tribesmen travelled to Athboy in Co Meath last
Saturday to take on a mainly young team in what was perceived as one the
‘easier’ games. As the game developed though, it was obvious that this
perception was wholly unjustified.
The Galway men kicked off deep into the Athboy half
and immediately had the Meath men pinned inside their own 20 metres. A knock on
by Athboy resulted in the Tribesmen gaining possession just short of the
opposition goal line and Aaron Byrne crashed over from short range to give the
Galway men their first score after just two minutes.
If the Tribesmen thought they had the measure of
their opponents at this early stage, then they were mistaken. The introduction
of experienced campaigner Simon Deevy from the side-line for Athboy after the
10 minute mark, kick-started the home team efforts and they were rewarded when Deevy
himself scored after being on the field just a couple of minutes.
As the game continued, the young Athboy team were
tenacious in defence, thwarting every effort that the Galway team could throw
at them. A number of errors by both teams meant that neither team were able to
dominate and take control of the game. It
was not until after 22 minutes when a break by Conor Loughrey allowed him to
sneak in to double the Tribesmen score. However, within a couple of minutes,
Deevy had touched down again at the other end to level the scores. After the
restart, the Meath team kept up the pressure and registered another try not
long after. The score was now 10-8 to Athboy. This was the first time that the
Tribesmen had been behind in a game since round one and this realization
prompted an improved performance for the remainder of the half with scores
coming from Seosamh McDonagh, Sion Sandland and James ‘Junior’ Kennedy. A further
score from Athboy put the half time score at 24-16 to the Galway men.
The second half saw the introduction of subs Dylan
Neary and Terry Abayomi to the Tribesmen line up and this provided a temporary
lift to the visitor’s offensive play. However, they were still unable to ruffle
a very resolute Athboy defence and uncustomary mistakes including a number of
high tackles ultimately let the Tribesmen down. It wasn’t until around the 20th
minute of the half when a yellow card shown to an Athboy player for mouthing to
the referee, opened up a bit of space for the Tribesmen. They capitalized on
this with a short range try from Roberto Tapia which was then followed by
McDonagh claiming his second and third. The scores were now at 38-16 to the
Tribesmen but Athboy were not finished yet. A concerted late rally added
another 10 points to the home teams score and the game finished 38-26.
The Tribesmen left Co Meath knowing a huge
improvement is needed if they are to be competing at the business end of the
season. Their next test is another away trip next Saturday when they travel to
Carlow to the newly formed Barracudas.
