Academy prove too strong for Wallace

Ballymena Academy scored a morale-boosting 31-0 home win over Wallace High School on Saturday.
A Ballymena Academy player dives full length in an attempt to dispossess a Wallace High School opponent during Saturday's match.A Ballymena Academy player dives full length in an attempt to dispossess a Wallace High School opponent during Saturday's match.
A Ballymena Academy player dives full length in an attempt to dispossess a Wallace High School opponent during Saturday's match.

Ballymena scored immediately from the kick off when full back Dean Reynolds broke through the Wallace defence and, several phases later, Marcus Rea was on hand to touch down following a clever off-load by Gary Small.

Rea converted his own try and, shortly afterwards, added a long-range penalty to increase the lead to ten points.

The remainder of the first half was a tightly contested affair, with neither team able to achieve dominance of territory or possession.

The 10-0 scoreline at the interval was a fair reflection of the first half action.

In the second half, Ballymena Academy came out of the blocks much quicker than Wallace and Marcus Rea narrowly missed with an early penalty attempt.

The aggressive Ballymena pack continued to dominate at the breakdown and a clever kick into space by Craig Hanna was chased and gathered by centre Jonny Rosborough, who powered over in the corner.

Rea added the touchline conversion to take the score to 17-0.

Ten minutes later, Rosborough scored an outstanding individual try.

He cut through the Wallace defence and showed exceptional pace and balance to finish from 60 metres out.

Marcus Rea again added the conversion to increase Ballymena’s lead to 24-0.

Wallace High created several try-scoring opportunities late in the second half however the home team defended stoutly in a five minute period in their own 22.

It was Ballymena Academy who had the last say when scrum-half Craig Hanna sniped through a gap to score below the posts.

Marcus Rea’s conversion took the score to 31-0 to Ballymena Academy.

Ballymena Academy: Reynolds, Alexander, Rosborough, Rea, Kosch, Small, Hanna; Gillan, Drennan, White, Jolly, Joe Thompson, Connolly, McKeown, Josh Thompson.

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