LAGAN HARPS SAW off Cappry Rovers this morning to advance to a meeting with Swilly Rovers in the Ulster final of the SFAI Under-16 Cup.
Lagan Harps 2 Cappry Rovers 1
Jack O’Donnell and Jack Parke netted the goals for Glenn Gallagher’s side in an entertaining game at The Moss, with a late goal by Kane McGlynn coming too late to enable Cappry mount a comeback.
O’Donnell’s opener, in the 19th minute was all that stood between the teams until Parke headed home in the dying moments.
O’Donnell’s was a brilliant strike, conjured all by himself and finished wonderfully from the edge of the box, right into Cian Gallen’s bottom corner.
O’Donnell was the provider for the second goal, scored two minutes from the end by the equally-excellent Parke, who headed home in style to seal Lagan’s passage into the final.
They were made sweat a little when McGlynn drilled past Oisin Bonner from 20 yards, but with four minutes of added time gone at that point, Cappry had run out of time.
It was Jamie Doherty’s men who had looked the more likely in the early exchanges.
Alex McGeehan had tried an ambitious effort from long-range that didn’t trouble the Lagan goalkeeper Bonner.
When Bonner let a cross from Evan McBride slip through his clutches, Cappry couldn’t pounce and, late in the half, it took a brave block by Lagan’s Dylan O’Brien to keep out a shot from McGlynn.
By then, though, Lagan had hit the front thanks to O’Donnell’s brilliant strike.
Caoimhin Wheeler warmed the hands of Cappry netminder Gallen and Gallen had to be on guard to turn over a shot by Parke with the tips of his fingers.
With Parke coming into the game, Lagan got a foothold, but Cappry always looked threatening and Bonner held onto a powerful drive from Joel Bradley-Walsh.
Lagan began the brighter in the second half, but with Gallen on form Cappry stayed in with a chance.
Saul Miller-Kelly tapped wide of a gaping goal after O’Donnell was denied and Parke fizzled over with an enterprising effort from 30 yards.
As Cappry turned the screw in search of McGlynn did have the ball in the net, but he was called offside.
Bonner denied Cappry again when Bradley-Walsh and Conor Doherty worked a short corner routine, but Parke made them pay when he converted the second goal that, finally, put the contest beyond Cappry’s reach.
Lagan Harps: Oisin Bonner; Eoin O’Connor, Dylan O’Brien, PJ McDaid, Conor Bonner; Caoimhin Wheeler, Jonathan Coady, Jack Parke, Saul Miller-Kelly; Jack O’Donnell, Dean Murray. Subs: Odhran Downey for Miller-Kelly, Darragh Rodgers for Murray, Enda Gallagher for O’Connor, Ryan Moore for Wheeler.
Cappry Rovers: Cian Gallen; Jamie Murray, Sean O’Connor, Odhrán McGlynn, Conor McCormick; Evan McBride, Alex McGeehan, Kieran Neeson, Conor Doherty; Joel Bradley-Walsh, Kane McGlynn. Subs: Oisin McElhinney for McBride, Shane Rowan for McCormick, Dylan Doherty for Gallen, Odhran O’Donnell for Neeson, Kieran Thompson for Murray, Dean Harvey for Bradley-Walsh.
Referee: Liam McLaughlin.
Tags: