Small margins undo juniors’ hopes

Both Munster teams were left wondering what might have been as a Junior Interpros dotted with impressive results slipped away from the southern province. The women’s team, coached by Graham Catchpole and Grant Sweetnam, started the tournament superbly against South East with Lorraine McGowan’s goal scant reward for a dominant first half. But Munster went to sleep and Kilkenny hotshot Lynn Darling took full advantage, rattling home two short corner goals while South East also plundered another corner to carry off a surprise 3-1 win. A shell-shocked Munster recovered well against a fancied Leinster side though. They went ahead through a short corner worked back to Barbara Deane in the injector spot before Leinster seemingly had it won as they roared back to lead 2-1.

But Fermoy’s Jess Ottman had other ideas, picking up the ball 60 metres from goal and taking off on a surging run that saw her burn off a couple of tacklers before squaring for McGowan to first-time reverse sweep an equaliser to the roof of the net with five minutes to go. Munster then ruined Connacht’s title charge, coming from two goals down to draw 2-2. First Blackrock’s Laura Hogan, moved from defence to attack, pounced when a cross came all the way through to her to control and slot home to give Munster a lifeline. It proved a turning point as Connacht had been in charge until then, while Munster had lost captain Lisa Treacy to a head injury. But they began to turn the screw, with Sandra Hedigan desperately unlucky not to get a scoring touch when Ottman raided the baseline and slipped the ball inside the keeper’s near post and across goal. Munster did equalise soon after when McGowan attempted to force home a short corner breakdown and the ball eventually went in off a Connacht stick. And they thought they’d won it when Emily Brownlow slotted home a loose ball, but a short corner had already been blown. Their last task was the toughest, up against an Ulster side who had yet to concede a goal. Goalkeeper Anne-Marie Byrne was in heroic form, denying the northern hordes on multiple occasions, but their overall quality proved too much to handle and Munster fell to a 6-0 defeat to finish bottom of the table on two points. The men’s team’s tournament started brightly under coach John Meyler with a memorable victory over Leinster but unravelled in a messy game against Connacht on the Sunday. Game one saw the reds go a goal down as Gareth Borland slotted a pinpoint drag-flick for Leinster, but they were soon level as Zimbabwean flyer Alistair MacLeod surged along the right endline and pulled back for Brian Egan to first-time to the bottom corner.

An intricate switch move saw Ciaran McNamara deflect home Leinster’s second shortly before half-time but Munster came out stronger and hit the hosts with two sucker punches. First Nigel Bateman made progress down the right and few David Quinn, whose pass found Eric Callender and he rifled home a reverse from the top of the D. Callender then turned provider, picking up a cross-field pass on the left and reversing low and hard across goal where Quinn met it with a delightful rising deflection for 3-2. Munster then had to batten down the hatches, Gavin Jeffery doing superbly to run down two Leinster drag-flicks in the dying minutes as the side held on for a famous victory. The exertions of that victory told later that day as fatigue played a part against an Ulster side opening their tournament account. A tight first half finished scoreless as Munster netminder Tristan Murphy did brilliantly to save a penalty stroke while Callender and the excellent Simon Brickenden were unlucky not to open Munster’s account. They went behind early in the second half when Aamir Khan’s pass out of defence hit an Ulster foot that went undetected by the umpires, and while Munster appealed, Richard Nelson surged through a rifled past Murphy. That began a purple patch for the northern side as they cleverly moved the ball around the Munster keeper for a tap-in shortly afterwards before David Atkinson saw his drag-flick nestle in the net to kill the game at 3-0, all within seven minutes of the first goal. It wasn’t the end of the day’s exertions for Munster vice-captain David Quinn, who played his third match of the day for his club as Kilkenny beat Rathgar 1-0 in the Neville Davin Cup final, the Waterford man setting up the winner with 10 seconds to go. The Ulster defeat left Munster needing to beat Connacht to stand any chance of being in contention for overall honours, having seen the westerners – back having missed the 2011 tournament – impress in a 1-1 draw with Leinster and a ding-dong 6-4 defeat to Ulster.

Munster started brilliantly with Brickenden cracking one against the post while MacLeod had a goal contentiously chalked off, before Brickenden found the net with a drag-flick and Callender finished brilliantly off a slick counter-attack for 2-0. The reds seemed to be cruising but Connacht turned the game on its head with a nice move from play and a sloppy corner scramble, while at the other end Callender and Macleod both rounded the Connacht keeper but couldn’t finish from tight angles. Felix Opola could have put Munster back in front when he beat two players at close quarters down the right and rounded the keeper, only to duff his reverse-stick shot. It summed up Munster’s day as Connacht, spurred on by Railway Union schemer Fergal Keaveney, let the ball do the work impressively to score three unanswered strikes and kill the game off. Brickenden did manage a reply when a switched corner was returned to him and he pivoted under pressure at the penalty spot to reverse-sweep home but it was too late and Munster went down 5-3. That gave Ulster the overall honours, while Leinster ensured Munster took the wooden spoon by hammering the champions 4-1 in the tournament’s final game. Junior Interprovincials, TRR Men: Leinster 2 Munster 3 (Brian Egan, Eric Callender, David Quinn); Ulster 3 Munster 0; Leinster 1 Connacht 1; Connacht 4 Ulster 6; Munster 3 (Simon Brickenden 2, Eric Callender) Connacht 5; Leinster 4 Ulster 1 Standings: 1. Ulster 6pts (+2) 2. Leinster 4pts (+2) 3. Connacht 4pts (0) 4. Munster 3pts (-4) Women: Leinster 2 Munster 2 (Barbara Deane, Lorraine McGowan); Munster 1 (Lorraine McGowan) South East 3; Connacht 3 Leinster 2; South East 0 Ulster 1; Ulster 4 Connacht 0; Munster 2 (Laura Hogan, own goal) Connacht 2; Leinster 0 Ulster 4; Connacht 2 South East 1; Ulster 6 Munster 0; South East 1 Leinster 2 Standings: 1. Ulster 12pts (+15) 2. Connacht 7pts (-2) 3. Leinster 4pts (-4) 4. South East 3pts (-4) 5. Munster 2pts (-8)