Hinch 10-11 Quins
Quins take the spoils
Ballynahinch v Belfast Harlequins
14-30 Ulster Championship League
Saturday 24 September 2011 at Ballymacaran Park.
Quins elected to play away from the Clubhouse against the, at times, stiff breeze and Sun.
After 9 mins, against the elements, Quins led 3-0 from a Michael Heaney penalty, from the 22 straight into the breeze. Towards the end of the half, Quins exerted pressure on Hinch, but the Hinch outhalf kicked a penalty to leave the halftime score Hinch 3 Quins 3.
From the restart Quins found touch on the left, off a Hinch man thus, giving Quins a lineout halfway between the Hinch 10m and 22m.
Winning the lineout Quins attacked right and Willie Stewart dummied, cut and broke past three men, before linking with Owen McMurray on the loop, who scored a terrific try. The conversion was missed leaving the score Hinch 3 Quins 8.
At 69 mins the referee spoke to a Hinch player and Michael Heaney kicked an important penalty, from just inside the Hinch 10 metre line: Hinch 3 Quins 11. Importantly Hinch now had to score twice.
With 6 mins of normal time to go, Hinch did score a try under the posts, which wasconverted by Hinch 10, to leave the score: Hinch 10 Quins 11.
But so it remained until the final whistle: Hinch (1 pen,1 goal) 10 Quins (2 pen,1try)11.
Thus, 4 League points to Quins and a losers’ bonus point to Hinch.
Quins used revolving substitutions in the 2nd half, with 16, 17, 19 and 20 coming on at various stages.
CLICK HERE For Pictures
This was a highly competitive match. Everyone played to the very best of their ability. Man of the match, after consultation, goes to Willie Stewart for his winning break and pass for Owen McMurray’s winning try.
Lawrence Babe impressed at lock in his inaugural match. As usual Michael Heaney’s fielding and kicking were superb. The entire front row and entire back row performed admirably and some of Mark Kettyle’s tackling was awesome and indeed our general defence was excellent. Perhaps a mild observation: Matthew Holmes and Andy Pollock are two fast wings who might have been put into more space.
The Quins Squad was
1 Robert Logan(c) 2 Niall Annett 3 Mark McGrath 4 Lawrence Babe
5 Michael Ferguson 6 Alister Heatlie 7 Danny Annett 8 Paul Rea
9 Michael Heaney 10 Owen McMurray 11 Matthew Holmes 12 Willie Stewart
13 Mark Kettyle 14 Andy Pollock 15 Rory Blake-Knox
16 Neil Montgomery 17 Paul Greenaway 18 Calum Leckey 19 Ryan Annett
20 David Creighton
See you at Deramore Park next Saturday, 1 October 2011, at 14-30, for our opening Ulster Bank All Ireland League Division IB match against the University of Limerick Bohemians side.
Well done, men, and Head Coach Adam Larkin. Great win!
