Winning start for St. Michaels’ rugby team

They had received a bye in the first round of the competition and met Slemish College from Ballymena in the second round at Pollock Park.

They got off to the worst possible start conceding a converted try in the first few minutes to go 7-0 down.

However, they soon responded with a Tiarnan Geddis penalty to reduce the deficit to 7-3.

The game was very tight with defences to the fore and it wasn’t until the last minute of the first half that St. Michael’s scored their first try, with Barry McCambridge barging over in the corner. Barry then stepped up and kicked a fantastic conversion from the touchline to leave the half-time score 10-7 in St. Michael’s favour.

Soon after the restart Slemish kicked a penalty to level the scores at 10-10 but for the rest of the match St Michael’s took control scoring three more tries, one of which was converted. Barry McCambridge scored his second, following up a kick beyond the Slemish defence. Scrum half Adam O’Neill stormed through the Slemish defence after taking a tap down from the line-out to score beside the posts with Tiarnan Geddis once again adding the conversion and Ross O’Neill scored a fine try in the corner after good work from the backline.

This left the final score 27-10 to St. Michael’s and they now go forward to the semi-finals. This was a fine performance and sets the team up well for the remainder of the season.