Caulry 1-10
Tyrrellspass 1-14
Despite a resilient display within the surrounds of TEG Cusack Park Mullingar on Saturday evening, Caulry exited the Westmeath senior football championship, a four point defeat to Tyrrellspass ending their quest for the prized Flanagan Cup silverware.
Talisman, Conor McCormack commenced scoring proceedings, Tyrrellspass then missing two opportunities thanks to the defensive commitment of Eoin Fox (who impressed throughout ) and when Paddy Sleator was fouled up front, Alan Malynn neatly slotted over for Caulry’s second score of the game. Malynn had a similar chance in the eighth minute but his accuracy was not on point and his shot drifted wide.
McCormack then slotted over the next score of the game minutes before Eoghan Grennan was forced to retreat to the line after picking up a black card. It took Tyrrellspass sixteen minutes to get their opening score of the game when county man and corner back Jamie Gonoud made a burst up the field and finished with a point. The opposition missed another couple of points before adding a free in the 20th minute. Damien Dolan pointed in the 23rd minute after combining nicely with Sean Fox, but Tyrrellspass were becoming more clinical up front and had the game level as the 26th minute elapsed. In the remaining minutes, the sides shared four points with McCormack on target for us to leave the game all-square at the break.
Caulry could not have wished for a better start to the second half as McCormack sent a high ball into Sleator who got a vital touch and sent the ball into the Tyrrellspass net. Now was the time for the Mount Temple/Baylin club to push on but the Tyrrellspass experience began to show as they were patient up front and worked a point on the 34th minute. The game continued on an end to end basis as the men in blue and navy always kept within touching distance, cancelling out points from Senan Baker and Stephen Connolly.
The tide began to turn then against Caulry as Tyrrellspass rattled off four unanswered points between the 42nd and 48th minutes to give themselves a one-point advantage. Caulry had two chances to regain their lead with efforts from Malynn and Luke Buckley going wide. Tyrrellspass then got the score that really changed the game on the 50th minute when they raised an all important green flag.
With four points now in their favour, the composed Tyrrellspass side maintained possession as the game ebbed towards its conclusion. A free from Malynn momentarily reduced the gap to three, but the Tyrrellspass men remained cool and collected as they replied with two points.
To give Caulry their playing due, they never gave up with Sleator adding the last point of the game but ultimately, Tyrrellspass had done enough to progress to the final four.
Caulry team and scorers: Jack Connaughton, Sean Fox, Kevin Maguire, Eoin Fox, Sean Clinton, Eoghan Grennan, Damien Dolan (0-1 ), Sean Doyle, Stephen Connolly (0-1 ), Ben Moran, Paddy Sleator (1-1 ), Conor McCormack (0-4, 2f ), Senan Baker (0-1 ), Colin Murphy, Alan Malynn (0-2 ).
Subs: Harry Hughes for Ben Moran, Emmet Nally for Colin Murphy, Tom Cloonan for Damien Dolan, Luke Buckley for Emmet Nally, Neil Clinton for Stephen Connolly
