Gareth Gill*, Nick Finlay, Matthew Hadden (Ballynahinch Rabbitohs) Curtis Stewart*, Matthew Cahoon*, Wayne Kelly (Belfast Met Scholars)<\/p>\n
Ireland \u2018A\u2019 Secure Inaugural Celtic Nations Championship<\/strong><\/p>\n A 28-22 victory for Ireland \u2018A\u2019 against Wales in Colwyn Bay secured the Wolfhounds their first Celtic Nations Championships.<\/p>\n Going into the game the Wolfhounds knew that they didn\u2019t necessarily have to win the fixture to secure the title but losing the game was never on the mind of Ged Corcoran\u2019s who wanted to make it a clean sweep on the way to their first championship win.<\/p>\n It was Wales who got off to the better start when centre, Bradley Hill gave his side a third minute lead with Paul Emanuelli converting before Brad Hargreaves unconverted opener for Ireland brought the score back to 6-4.<\/p>\n An Aled Davies try in the corner on 21 minutes extended Wales lead to 10-4 but the hosts would only hold that advantage for a further nine minutes.<\/p>\n Mikey Russell was next over for Ireland with Curtis Stewart following suit two minutes before the break. Casey Dunne converted both to give the Wolfhounds a 16-10 lead at the break.<\/p>\n Mark Kenny\u2019s unconverted effort on 53 minutes extended the lead further before Gareth Gill scored in the first set after kick off to put the game out of Wales reach. Dunne converted to make the score 26-10.<\/p>\n Then came Wales comeback. A strong run and try from Geraint Clarke on 65 minutes was immediately followed by John Ketland scoring in the corner after an excellent team passing move. <\/p>\n Emanuelli converted both and Wales were just four points down and while the title looked out of reach, a win wasn\u2019t beyond them.<\/p>\n But the Irish defence stood firm and despite the passionate Welsh crowd cheering their team on, it was the newly crowned champions who had the final say as Dunne added a penalty just before the hooter to launch the celebrations.<\/p>\n WALES DRAGONHEARTS<\/strong> Subs (all used):<\/p>\n 6 Rob Andrews Tries: Hill (3), Davies (21), Clarke (65), Ketland (68) IRELAND<\/strong> Subs (all used): Tries: Hargreaves (14), Russell (30), Stewart (38), Kenny (53), Gill (57) Half-time: 10-16 Gareth Gill*, Nick Finlay, Matthew Hadden (Ballynahinch Rabbitohs) Curtis Stewart*, Matthew Cahoon*, Wayne Kelly (Belfast Met Scholars) Ireland \u2018A\u2019 Secure Inaugural Celtic Nations Championship A 28-22 victory for Ireland \u2018A\u2019 against Wales in Colwyn Bay secured the Wolfhounds their first Celtic Nations Championships. Going into the game the Wolfhounds knew that they didn\u2019t necessarily have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2432,1],"tags":[5888,10175,5294,4050,7218,7311],"class_list":["post-71821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ireland-rugby-league","category-irish-rugby","tag-a","tag-celtic","tag-championship","tag-ireland","tag-nations","tag-secure"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71821","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=71821"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71823,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71821\/revisions\/71823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n5 Lee Goddard
\n14 John Ketland
\n4 Mike Hurley
\n3 Daryl Carter
\n19 Aled Davies
\n7 Callum Bennett
\n18 Paul Emmaunelli
\n16 Geraint Clarke
\n9 Ryan Bates
\n10 Scott Britton
\n11 Bradley Hill
\n12 Chris True
\n13 Gareth Way<\/p>\n
\n8 Lee Harben Jones
\n20 Nathan Hawkins
\n17 Anthony Tilley<\/p>\n
\nGoals: Emanuelli 3\/4<\/p>\n
\n1 Casey Dunne
\n2 Columba Kelly
\n3 Callum Mulkeen
\n4 Brad Hargreaves
\n5 Mark Kenny
\n6 Nick Finlay
\n7 Adam Cox
\n8 Gareth Gill
\n9 Mikey Russell
\n10 Matty Hadden
\n11 Matty Cahoon
\n12 Chris Hall
\n13 Wayne Kelly<\/p>\n
\n14 Matt Bailey
\n15 Sean Rees
\n16 Curtis Stewart
\n17. Andrew Keating<\/p>\n
\nGoals: Dunne 4\/6<\/p>\n
\nReferee: Liam Moore
\nAttendance: 250
\nMatch Report Courtesy of Wales Rugby League<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"