On Saturday Armagh Power NI played a confident Portadown side in the forster cup quarter final in perfect conditions for fast running rugby at an overcast Palace Grounds. The game started at break neck pace with Portadown throwing the kitchen sink at Armagh, but the young side showed their maturity and held their line of defence, manage to turn the ball over and clear their lines. After a great line out steal from the Armagh pack he ball was moved wide from half backs Andy Knipe and Stanley Hamilton to centres Matty Allen and Robert Straghan the pack worked hard to take a line off Hamilton with Andy Morton and Stuart McMahon carrying hard. At the next phase Captain Chris Wallace broke the line and made good ground up the right wing and fed Straghan inside who scored under the posts.
The game restarted and Armagh started the way they left off, and moved the ball wide with the pack clearing good ball for Hamilton to feed the backs fast ball. At the next breakdown the ref deemed that Armagh were holding on at the ruck, an interesting decision with the tackler not releasing the player first. Portadown put the ball in the corner and again threw everything at Armagh, but the defence held out again and Flanker Colly Cochrane stole the ball and ran from deep inside his own ’22’ and scored out wide. Before half time Portadown got their only score of the game through a penalty. 12-3
Armagh began the second half in stunning fashion with a score from Cochrane through a great driving maul from the pack. The floodgates opened again with scores coming from Hamilton, Mark Allen and Mark Laverty. This was a tougher game than the score line suggests, Armagh were a lot smaller and lighter than the big Portadown pack, but with some clever thinking and hard tackling another team has been put to the sword. Armagh now await the draw for the semi final which will be away from home.
