\nof the two clubs and in doing so had to deal with the late withdrawal of
\na number of players after training on Thursday.
\nPICTURED:
\n1)Bruff Chairman, Richard Leonard, and BRFC Chairman, Neil Patton exchange gifts to mark the occasion of the first meeting of the two clubs in the AIL
\n2)For the first time in the history of the Club, three brothers were on the field of play at the same time. Pictured are Joel, Ricky and John Andrew
\nCLICK HERE FOR PICTURES OF I XV v BUCCANEERS
\nInjuries to Conor Carey, Stephen Mulholland, Ross Hackney, Luke Marshall
\nand Mike McComish meant that quite a different team took to the field in
\nBruff, than that which played at Eaton Park the previous week.
\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/eurosports.jpg\" "\\"Click")
<\/a>\nWith the weather not providing ideal playing conditions, Ballymena
\nstarted briskly and won a penalty after two minutes, but it drifted
\njust past the outside of the upright. Not long after a good tackle by
\nPritchard, off the back of a ruck, lead to turnover ball and the
\nimpressive new signing Richard Aingworth broke through to open the
\nscoring after five minutes. O’Hara kicked a good conversion from out
\nwide to leave it 0-7 to Ballymena.<\/p>\n
Bruff bounced back with some force from their big pack but Ballymena
\ndefended well to clear. Shortly after Bruff won a penalty and Brian
\nCahil send it wide. Bruff continued to press and after 15 mins won
\nanother penalty, this time going for the corner. They won clean ball but
\nin the following attack they knocked on after further good defence from
\nBallymena.<\/p>\n
Back Bruff came a third time,and this time they made it count with their
\nforwards powering over, their no 8 Carroll getting the touchdown
\nwhich Cahill converted, to draw them level.<\/p>\n
They took the lead shortly after with a penalty from Cahill on 22mins.
\nThis was followed on 25mins with another opportunity missed.<\/p>\n
Ballymena came back at Bruff with a number of phases inside their half
\nand in the advance towards the 22 Blane McIlroy side stepped his
\nopposite number to go in under the posts which with the straight-forward
\nconversion brought the score to 10-14 in Ballymena’s favour.<\/p>\n
Bruff bounced right back with another period of pressure and a number of
\nphases in the Ballymena 22 before their winger Andrew Cashman crossed
\nin the corner. The conversion was missed but the home side edged ahead
\n15-14.<\/p>\n
On the approach to the interval Ballymena were on the attack again,
\nwinning a penalty which they kicked to the corner. The following play
\nled to another penalty which O’Hara converted to leave the visitors
\nahead 15-17 at half-time.<\/p>\n
The second period began with a ding-dong battle in the middle of the
\npark, and 15mins into the half Ballymena, after some good work, extended
\ntheir lead through the impressive Aingworth who broke a couple of
\ntackles to score his second try of the match. O’Hara converted to make
\nit 15-24.<\/p>\n
Shortly afterwards John Semple kicked ahead and in the chase Aingworth
\nsteamed past, and as his hat-trick looked certain, he gave the last touch
\nmarginally too much and the ball beat him to the dead-ball line.<\/p>\n
On 60mins history was made in the Ballymena team with the
\nintroduction of 18 year old John Andrew, joining his brothers Joel and
\nRicky on the pitch, three brothers playing together for the first time
\nin the Club’s AIL campaign.<\/p>\n
Bruff won another penalty on 63mins which Cahill converted, and two minutes
\nlater they scored another try through replacement John Carroll, which
\nCahill converted to put the home team ahead once again, the score now
\nreading 25-24. What a game!<\/p>\n
Both teams threw everything into the last quarter and after a very good
\nmove by Alan Smyth where he jinked jinked his way past three Bruff players to
\nfine Ricky Andrew who made a good break down the line. He found Aingworth
\nin support and another try look on, but the ball was lost forward. From
\nthe resulting scrum Bruff advanced again and just as a worried look came
\nover the faces of the loyal Ballymena support, Semple intercepted
\nbrilliantly to run the length of the pitch to score a fourth try, which
\nhe converted himself. The score on 75mins 25-31 in favour of Ballymena.<\/p>\n
Semple sealed the game on 81mins with a penalty to extend the lead to
\n25-34, leaving Bruff needing two scores. The referee played on and Bruff
\nwere awarded, and converted a penalty on 82mins to gain a losing bonus
\npoint, However it was a heroic performance from the Ballymena men who
\nreturned home with a second win on Munster soil in three weeks.<\/p>\n
Les McCracken<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bruff v Ballymena Sat 15th October Ballymena travelled to meet Bruff RFC for the first time in the history of the two clubs and in doing so had to deal with the late withdrawal of a number of players after training on Thursday. PICTURED: 1)Bruff Chairman, Richard Leonard, and BRFC Chairman, Neil Patton exchange gifts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[6734,17197,7498,2720,5983,4275,4374,4702,3959,4281],"class_list":["post-17457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ballymena","tag-6734","tag-ballymena","tag-bruff","tag-buccaneers","tag-from","tag-i","tag-pictures","tag-report","tag-rugby","tag-xv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}