19 October, 2012
Bray Emmets 0-12 Rathnew 0-12.
Bray senior footballers resumed action in the county league last
Friday night at home to Rathnew following their county semi final
replay defeat 4 weeks ago. Bray were without 5 of the starting 15
and 7 of the panel overall from the semi final but the strength of
the squad this year was demonstrated by the fact that
they drew this match 12 points each having been down 5 points with
13 minutes left to play. Bray started brightly with an excellent
point from play after three minutes from Tony Denver who drove up
from corner back (good wishes to Tony and his fiancée on his
upcoming wedding this Saturday!). Rathnew came back and scored two
points from play in the 7th and 8th minutes. Des Kelly replied with
a great free for Bray in the 9th minute. Rathnew then enjoyed a
period of dominance scoring three points between the 13th and 20th
minutes (2 frees and 1 from play) to leave the score 6 points to 2
in favour of Rathnew. Then Bray put in a great burst, between the
22nd and 28th minutes, driven on by the midfield dominance of Ray
Lambe and Brian O Keeffe. This resulted in three great scores one
from Daire Lohan (playing his first full senior game) and two great
scores from Des Kelly. Rathnew finished the half with a point from
a free to leave the half time score at Rathnew 7 points, Bray 5
points.
Rathnew started the second half strongly and scored the first
two points in the 31st and 32nd minutes (one from a free and one
from play). Then Daire Lohan kicked a great free in the 34th minute
to narrow the gap to 3 points. This was followed by two Rathnew
points from play in the 35th and 37th minutes to leave 5 points
between the sides. In the 38th minutes Daire Lohan kicked another
great score and this was immediately followed by a Rathnew free to
again leave 5 points between the sides with 14 minutes left. At
this stage of the game Ray Lambe who had an excellent game at
midfield had to come off with a serious facial injury. It was at
this stage that the Bray squad showed the tremendous never say die
attitude that they have displayed in many games this year. In the
last 14 minutes they outscored Rathnew 5 points to nil to draw the
match. It started with two great Daire Lohan frees in the 46th and
55th minutes. Then David Finn, who had an excellent game at corner
forward, kicked a great point from play in the 56th minute. This
was followed by a tremendous free from Des Kelly to put Bray within
one score of Rathnew and in the 61st minute Tony Denver raced up
the field again from his corner back position and kicked a massive
point off his left leg 40 yards out to level the game in the 62nd
minute to leave the final score at 12
points each. There was tremendous leadership shown by
the senior players on the squad which was complimented by the
enthusiasm and energy of some of the very young players such as
Daire Lohan, Cormac Martin, Adam Conway and Cathal O Dualachain and
the other subs that came on. A feature of the squad performance in
this and other games was the discipline shown by all the
players who stayed focussed on getting a result right to the end
and got their just rewards at the final whistle. It should also be
noted that Steven Carton in goals had a fine game following in the
very safe hands of Paul O' Keeffe who was injured. Finally we
welcome back Luke Benson who came on in the second half following a
year working abroad.
