McFetridge stars in convincing Gordon West Cup tie victory

Randalstown 0

LARNE played host to Randalstown in the Gordon West Cup and romped to victory with a convincing 63-0 win.

The Glynn men immediately put pressure on the visitors and this paid off in the form of two early penalties, which allowed Garrett to give the home side an early advantage.

After several attacking moves, Larne broke through the Randalstown defence when Johnny McFetridge touched down for the first try, which Garrett converted.

Growing in confidence, Larne were able to apply sustained pressure and Garrett threw a wide pass to Thomas, who touched down in the corner.

Larne dominated the set play area, especially the scrums, which gave the back line a good platform for attack. This resulted in a neat move with Hall off-loading to Mills for his first score of the day.

After the interval, Garrett broke around the back of the Randalstown defence and good link play with Crampsey allowed the scrum-half to score under the posts.

Another wave of attack allowed McFetridge to break the line again and he off-loaded to fellow second row Garstin, who scored.

A short time later, Garstin popped up again with good support for his second of the day.

Later in the half, Thomas was on hand to finish another two tries to give him his hat-trick

Randalstown were starved of the ball for most of the game, but to their credit fought for everything until the final whistle. The referee signalled for full-time with 20 minutes remaining.

Man of the match: Johnny McFetridge

Team: M. Knox, C. Gibson, D. Hagans, D. Garstin, J. McFetridge (c), E. Hunter, M. Crampsey, J. McCluggage, R. Garrett, G. Knox, R. Thomas, S. Knox, J. Hall, G. Mills, S.Marshall.

Fixtures (Saturday, October 30): Larne v Ballyshannon (a); Larne II v Portadown III (a); Larne III v Donaghadee III (h).

Meanwhile, Larne Seconds got back to winning ways with an excellent 24-7 away victory against Innishowen Firsts.

The first try came courtesy of Aaron Gowdy, with Matthew Agnew converting the kick. Steven Johnston then crashed over in the corner, giving Larne’s a 12-0 lead at half-time.

The score of the game came in the opening few minutes of the second period, when Aaron Gowdy glided over the line after a great passage of team play.

Innishowen pressure paid off with a converted try mid-way through the half before Mark Magill responded for Larne with a try which Phil Agnew converted to win the match.