Amateurs have the X Factor at Dungiven

The 20-year-old, who rose to national fame when he came third in the 2008 series of the TV talent show, plays as a striker for his hometown team – but on Saturday he couldn’t stop Dromore from running out 2-0 winners in this Irish Cup first round fixture.

Simon Cowell and Louis Walsh would have been fighting it out between themselves over who got to sign up this Dromore side after they put in a show-stopping performance away from home.

The Amateurs kept things tight in the first half, before Roger Downey had the crowd on their feet with a bullet-like 22-yard free kick in the second period, and striker Robert Coady passed his audition with flying colours with a slick finish to make it 2-0.

The tour bus was rocking all the way from Dungiven, and now the Amateurs can look forward to the “boot camp” stage of the Irish Cup, ie, the second round!

This Saturday, Dromore will be on the hunt for three valuable league points when they entertain 18th Newtownabbey OB at Ferris Park.

Dromore Amateurs Seconds 2 Donard Hospital Seconds 4 - GIVING away sloppy goals while missing clear-cut chances of your own – the perfect recipe for losing a game of football.

Dromore Amateurs Seconds, sponsored by McDonald’s Mace, lost their third straight league game in a row on Saturday, and the frustrating thing is that they have only themselves to blame.

Dromore dominated the first half-hour and then – bang-bang – they were 2-0 down in the space of three minutes.

And it got worse before it got better – after half-time, Donard scored straight from the kick-off, before adding a fourth 20 minutes later.

The truth is that Dromore didn’t play all that badly, and over the 90 minutes actually created enough goalscoring chances to win three games.

They threatened a dramatic comeback on Saturday when Philip Smith and Marcel Beattie converted two excellent goals, and they had Donard on the rack in the closing stages, but it all proved too little, too late.

This weekend, the Seconds are away to Lisanally Rangers in the Irish Junior Cup.