Youths League: Waterford Crystal 1 vs Mooncoin Celtic 2

A trip to the RSC grounds for the game today saw us come away with a hard earned victory against a decent Crystal side.
We started the game superbly and created a few opportunities from open play and corners.
The quality of delivery from these corners was of the highest order and enabled us to open the scoring after 20 mins .
A brilliantly flighted corner from Evan Cleary towards the back post was met by James Delahunty, who rose majestically above several defenders to bury his header past the Waterford Crystal keeper.
Although we were playing some terrific football for most of the half a long ball up field from the home team wasn’t dealt with and resulted in a free kick for Crystal. The delivery into the box caught out some of our lads asleep and the Crystal striker nodded the ball into the bottom corner.
The home side roared into the game and dominated the physical exchanges and were the better side for the remainder of the half.
Facing a gale of wind in the second half wasn’t going to be an easy task and serious questions were asked of this teams character and ability to dig out a result.
Although we struggled to get up the pitch with the conditions the back four and midfield trio showed great courage to limit the opposition to long range efforts.
A reshuffle on the hour mark saw a momentum swing in the game when the lads took the game by the scruff of the neck and drove the home team deep into their own half with some great passing and running off the ball. Such was the quality of our play we should’ve added a couple of more goals only for some tight offside decisions.
As the game entered the last quarter the lads showed their talent and character in abundance and when Evan won a super tackle in midfield Lee Tracey pounced on the loose ball to send Conor Stacey clear and as was about to shoot a defender upended him to concede a penalty.
Up stepped Dylan Harrington to keep up his 100% record from the spot. We saw out the last few minutes without conceding too many clear cut chances.
The confidence and work ethic that these lads showed today was a joy to witness from start to finish.
Great performance again by the whole squad today keeps us in the hunt for the title.

Credit must go to the management team of John Ryan, Patrick Dobbyn and Ethan Ryan as their hard work and preparing of this talented squad since last August has the boys still in the mix for league honours.