Amateurs miss out in Ard fought thriller

Dromore Amateurs Youth U10s 2

A LARGE travelling support followed the young team to Newtownards last Thursday night and they were treated to another fine display of football from two very good sides.

Dromore welcomed debutant R Taylor into the line-up. The U10s were determined right from the whistle to take the game to Ards and the opening chances all fell to Dromore.

J Corbett found himself racing through on goal, one on one with the opposong goalie; after sending the goalie the wrong way he was unlucky not to score with his left foot effort, as the Ards defence had got back to clear it off the line at the last moment. N Hamilton and R Gallagher also had good chances to open the scoring only to find their efforts blocked by the Ards defence.

The Dromore defence of R Cobb, R Taylor, C McCarthy and J Howard were extremely determined not to let the Ards team score and this was evident by them overpowering the Ards strikers and clearing the danger.

J Howard who must have got hit at least three times in the face with the ball typified the desire that all the kids were showing in the game as he didn’t let this bother him and went on to win the ball on numerous occassions. C McCarthy who was also having a fine game in defence was working hard, winning the ball with some Stuart Pearce tackles and helping the midfielders with some neat attacking play.

As the numerous chances for Dromore were missed, it was Ards that scored the first goal of the game from their first attempt.

As the first half was coming to a close, Dromore's midfield dynamo R Gallagher was left bitterly disappointed after he struck a fine effort from 25 yards only to see the ball hit the crossbar and go over for a goal kick.

Dromore's downfall in previous games as been the second half, where they seem to gift soft goals to their opponents and they did the same again in this match just as they had gotten themselves back into the game.

Leading goal-scorer N Hamilton got the first goal for Dromore and M Brush scored the second to bring the scoreline back to 3-2. This goal was celebrated in true permiership style when M Brush took of his top and ran the full length of the pitch ending with a somersault much to the amusement of the Dromore supporters.

He was heartbroken when he realised he had to run back 60 yards to get his top again and the coaches are still wondering if he got a yellow card which would be the teams first of the season.

The U10s deserved a better result than this but the standard to which they applied themselves was mightily impressive and with three league games to go hopefully they will finish on a winning note.

The George Best Man of the Match was awarded to R Gallagher along with the players vote for Man of the Match. The coaches Man of the Match award went to the very deserving J Howard.