Cup glory for Cross & passion hurlers

Cross and Passion, Ballycastle defeated An Dún 2-12 to 0-17 in the final of the Mageean Cup on Friday evening to lift the title for the second time in successive years. In what was described as one of the most intensely fought finals seen in recent years, the Ballycastle side showed their quality and class to come out on top dominant and set off jubilant celebrations as they bagged the seventh title in the school’s history.

Ruairi Og, Cushendall have set themselves up with a challenging Ulster Senior Club final next week after they secured a 2-10 to 0-10 victory over Derry Champions Slaughtneil in Sunday’s semi-final replay at Loughguile. The sides needed the replay after playing out a 3-17 to 0-26 draw in their initial meeting.

Cross and Passion teacher and coach Oran Kearney could not have been prouder of his side commenting: “This was a welldeserved win. Even though we were champions and had convincing wins on the way, we were by no means favourites. An Dún wanted it bad and we knew they would bring it tough, however, I didn’t think it was going to be quite so tightly fought.

“The last couple of minutes were very tense but the young fellows showed great character to fight to the end. They had been well drilled all week and the performance they produced in the last five or ten minutes was tremendous and all credit to them, they stayed in the game and deserved this phenomenal victory.”

Match reports on page 48