Youthful Ormond fall to Ballymena
RUGBY UNION: Energia All Ireland League Division 2A Round 7
Ballymena 46
Nenagh Ormond 12
Nenagh Ormond made the long journey to North Antrim for a clash with Ballymena in Eaton Park in round 7 of the All-Ireland League on Saturday.
Ballymena are one of the traditional heavyweights of Ulster rugby and indeed are past AIL Division 1 champions. They won that honour in the 2002-03 season and along with Dungannon are one of only two Ulster winners in the thirty-year history of the league.
The rich history of the club was further demonstrated by a look at those in attendance at Saturday’s pre-match function with Lions and Ireland legend Willie John McBride among their number. In more recent seasons they have fallen down the ranks by their own standards, but recent evidence suggests they are starting to turn things in a positive direction.
A focus on giving young, local players opportunities in recent seasons looks to be paying dividends and on Saturday they fielded a good mix of youth and hardened experience which ultimately proved the right formula to defeat our travelling side.
For Nenagh this too is very much a transitional season. A number of our most experienced players of the past few years have retired or moved on in the past while, and while it is heartening to see young players coming through from our youth teams and representing the senior side, on some days the lessons of life in the adult game can make for a difficult schooling. This unfortunately was to be one of those days.
With a dire run of luck lately in terms of Covid related absences, combined with a mounting injury list, Nenagh made the trip shorn of quite a few starters and a few more of those on the side were bravely battling on with knocks they had yet to fully recover from.
To put it in context, five of our starters were aged 21 or under. No one can fault the efforts of the team on the day, but the Ballymena side played to their strengths particularly in terms of their scrum dominance and in total they scored seven tries in a ruthless performance.
Credit to the Nenagh lads however for battling to the end and indeed being the better side in the closing quarter when thoughts might have drifted to the journey home. Experienced second row Kevin O’Flaherty led the way in scoring both tries. They say in rugby that you win or you learn. A lot of lessons will have been learned here as well as valuable experience banked for those younger players in terms of what it takes to succeed at this level. While hard to swallow at the time, they will be all the stronger for experiences like these as their careers develop.
Next Saturday is now a massive day for this Nenagh side with a home fixture against fellow strugglers Old Crescent who also had a tough day out last Saturday in defeat to Cashel. Hopefully some of the Nenagh absentees will get fit in time for this game and help earn some badly needed league points. Now more than ever it is vital to show support for this team as they battle to maintain our hard-earned status in Division 2A of the All-Ireland League. Kick-off is at 2.30pm.
TEAMS – Ballymena: Rodger McBurney, Rhys Ervine, Mark Thompson, Glen Baillie, Dean Miller; Tim Small, Ian Vance; Joseph Mawhinney, James McCormick, Chris Cundell; Paddy Browne, Jonny Browne; James Howe, Adam Lamont, James McNabney.
Reps: Simon McWhirter, James Taggart, Patrick Hargy, Matthew Dick, Sam Miller.
Nenagh Ormond: Fionn McGibney, Derek Corcoran, Conor McMahon, Willie Coffey, Peter Coman; James Finn, Peter Rainsford; Damien Dunne, Conor Muldoon, Niall O'Gorman; Kevin O'Flaherty, Darragh Tucker; Rob Buckley, James Meagher, Evan Murphy.
Reps: Peter O'Connor. Cathal Ryan, John Hayes, Cian Ryan, Scott Pearson.
Referee: Jonathan Peak