St. Mary’s make mockery of League positions with win over Garryowen

Garryowen 14 St Mary’s College 23

Hennessy, a native of Limerick, doesn’t need reminding of how difficult it is for a Dublin side to travel to his home town and depart with a result - more so against a team ranked seven places above them in Division One.

Given that they were very much in contention for the league and cup double entering the business end of the season, one might have expected a top-of-the-range performance from Garryowen, but they were outplayed by a hungrier and commendably committed Mary’s XV.

“The league has been out of our reach for a long time and we’re just happy to be safe”, said Hennessy.

“We came here with nothing to lose and determined to give it a really good go, and that’s just what we did. We marshalled their back-row and half-backs very well, which meant that Paul Neville and Gerry Hurley weren’t able to make any significant breaks, and I thought our set piece was also very good. The return of Mark McHugh made a really big difference and Keith Douglas, who is only 21, scored one fine try and played a part in another.”

Hennessy was sporting enough to wonder whether Garryowen had one eye on next week’s all-important league clash with Limerick neighbours Shannon, at the same venue, as this was a cup semi-final that failed to ignite.

Paul Neville forced his way over for a first half try for an interval lead of 8-6. But Mary’s took the initiative in the second half when Douglas went over for their first try. Their second followed near the end when prop Cillian O’Byrne crossed at the posts.

Rival kickers, Conor Kilroy for Garryowen, and Jonathan Sexton and McHugh for Mary’s, kept the scoreboard ticking over, but there was little else to ward off the biting cold.

Mary’s now look forward to their April 8 final date with Cork Constitution, while Garryowen have the less enviable task of trying to regroup in time for their clash with Shannon.

GARRYOWEN: A. Finn; F. Daly, K. Hartigan, P. Devlin, C. O’Boyle; C. Kilroy, G. Hurley; R. Brosnan, D. Varley, R. Laffan, M. Melbourne, D. Sheehan, P. Neville, P. Malone, A. Kavanagh.

Replacements: P. Humphreys for Varley half time; N. Hartigan for Laffan 50; J. O’Sullivan for Kavanagh 60; F. Pala’amo 63.

ST MARY’S COLLEGE: P. Brophy; R. Smyth, K. Douglas, M. McHugh, J. McWeeney capt; J. Sexton, J. Kilbride; C. O’Byrne, P. Smyth, P. Collins, E. Keane, W. Duggan, P. Nash, H. Gervais, A. Copeland. Replacements: O. McCormack for P. Smyth 68; M. Donnellan and B. O’Donohue for Duggan and Gervais 73.

Referee: D. Courtney (IRFU).