Murphy points Vincent’s to victory in city derby
Man-of-the-match JP Murphy was central to that victory with seven points from full-forward while wing back Darren O’Regan and former Cork senior football goalkeeper Paddy O’Shea both gave fine displays.
Mayfield can have no complaints as they rarely threatened a goal – save for a good Nicky Kelly effort in the second period that brought the best out of O’Shea. But they were also wasteful in attack.
They notched six wides in the first-half but crucially, three of those came in the space of three minutes coming up to half-time when they trailed by six.
Barry Hegarty had just kicked a brilliant point, their first in 15 minutes, to make it 1-6 to 0-3 but when they had St Vincent’s pinned inside their own half they failed to convert dominance into scores.
As expected, a knockout derby clash failed to live up to the pre-match hype and the opening period was poor with wind-assisted St Vincent’s landing a few early blows to shoot into a 1-2 to 0-1 point advantage.
Murphy opened their account on two minutes with a free but Mayfield’s best player on the night, Nicky Kelly, cancelled it out a minute later.
However, the game took a decisive turn on five minutes when corner-forward Anthony Harte won good possession on the wing, skinned his marker and lashed a cracking drive into the top left-hand corner.
That score proved the catalyst for a further three points to make it 1-5 to 0-2 by the 20th minute — Murphy with all three.
Mayfield did finish the half with two points through Hegarty and Eoin Crowley but the wides that accompanied them proved costly. The second-half failed to ignite with St Vincent’s just doing enough to keep their opponents at arm’s length.
Paul Condon at full-forward for Mayfield landed two points in the opening 10 minutes and he looked more and more dangerous as the game progressed but the goal they craved never looked like coming.
Murphy and Condon traded white flags on 48 minutes and Barry Hegarty made it a three-point game with 10 to play but Paddy O’Shea knocked over a 45 and Murphy added his seventh with two minutes to go to send them through to a meeting with either Newmarket or Naomh Abán.
Scorers for St Vincent’s: J P Murphy 0-7 (6fs), A Harte 1-0, D Duggan, P O’Shea (0-1 45), D O’Regan (0-1) each.
Scorers for Mayfield: P Condon 0-5 (2fs), B Hegarty 0-2, N Kelly, E Crowley (0-1) each.
ST VINCENT’S: P O’Shea; T O’Connell, A Fenton, W Murphy; A O’Callaghan, C Kenneally, D O’Regan; S Rea, P O’Sullivan; D Duggan, D O’Connor, K Lynch; G Kelleher, JP Murphy, A Harte.
Subs: J Buckley for K Lynch (ht), P Aherne for A O’Callaghan (40), D O’Connell for S Rea (40), C Barry for J Buckley (45), T O’Sullivan for A Harte (56).
MAYFIELD: R Quane; B O’Leary, S Hackett, R Furney; D Lucey, P Fitzgerald, G Lehane; S Kelly, C Bond; N Kelly, B Hegarty, S Fitzgerald; R Scannell, P Condon, E Crowley.
Subs: R O’Sullivan for E Crowley (40), S O’Sullivan for R Scannell (45), P Scannell for C Bond (50).
Referee: Eamon Sheehy (Newcestown).
