U-21s V Swinford–Match Report

• Match Reports
• By darraghmc

Davitts U-21 team got their County C Champaign off to a winning start after a hard earned 1-12 to 0-7 victory away to Swinford on Sunday. An unanswered 1-5 in the last ten minutes swung the game in the visitors favour as they finally got to grip with the Swinford challenge.

Cian Naughton opened the scoring with a fine Davitts point from distance in the first minute. Swinford equalised in the eighth minute but a point from play by wing back Aidan Macken and a free converted by Evan Ronane put Davitts two ahead after 11 minutes. Swinford pointed twice to level the match but Davitts captain Evan Ronane fired over three excellent points before Swinford completed the first half scoring with a 30^th minute point to leave Davitts ahead by 0-6 to 0-4 at halftime.

Jack Ronayne pointed a free in the opening minute of the second half but Swinford points in the 38^th and 39^th minutes left the minimum between the teams. In the 40^th minute Evan Ronane received a black card and three minutes later Swinford equalised and at this stage they looked the more likely winners.

Davitts responded in fine fashion with Jack Ronayne converting two frees in the 52^nd and 55^th minutes. Two minutes later the same player supplied a defence splitting pass to Ryan McLoughlin and he made no mistake to finish in style for the game’s only goal.

Stephen Nyland shot the last three points of the game, two of them were long range frees of the highest calibre and the third a close in free after Niall Treacy was fouled.

Davitts will have to improve on this performance if they are to advance to the knockout stages. They had fine performances from Ciaran Fahy, Dmitry Trench, Jordan Flanagan, Evan Ronane up to his dismissal, Stephen Nyland (second half) while second half subs, the lively Niall Treacy and Niall Kearns, contributed well towards the victory. Next up is a home game against Ballyhaunis.

Davitts: Dean Moran, Tom Corless, Ciaran Fahy, Aidan Macken (0-1), Dmitry Trench, Jordan Flanagan, Daniel Huane, Cian Naughton (0-1), Liam Macken, Jack Ronayne (0-3), Evan Ronane (0-4), Ryan McLoughlin (1-0), Stephen Nyland (0-3). Subs used: Niall Treacy, Niall Kearns, James Ruane, Oisin O Connor, Kelan Cosgrove.