The Dee welcomed Newry to Donaldson Park amid a few personnel changes from the victory over BHSFP last week occasioned by holidays and unavailability. It was therefore once again a slightly unfamiliar side that took to the field to play a team that had caused the Dee significant problems in the same fixture last season. Newry had appointed a new Head Coach over the close season in the form of Alistair Heatlie and had got off to a good start in the league last week in comfortably overcoming Cavan.

Playing “up the hill” the Dee got off to a solid start with Kyle Morrow and Sam Ingham prominent in the opening forays. Before long skipper Matthew Stockton pierced the home defence before being stopped inside the opposition’s 22. The ball was quickly recycled and spun to Stockton’s centre partner Karl Yellop who with a combination of footwork, pace and raw power crossed the line to open the Dee’s account. The conversion was missed but the Dee continued to be the dominant side playing some superb rugby the main feature of which was the sharp interplay between backs and forwards. The Newry defence kept the home side at bay but the South Down side were clearly finding it hard to cope with Stockton & Yellop’s power plays through midfield. With young scrum-half Matthew Mingout developing his partnership with the returning Mark Cooper at 10 the two profited from excellent lineout work orchestrated by the other two school leavers on the side, hooker Morgan Macartney and lock Adam McCracken, to provide a variety of attacking options for the back five. From one of these attacks the Newry midfield defence was again cracked to create the space for full-back Danny McBride to break through for the line. After being initially held up McBride forced his way over the line and dotted down for the Dee’s second try of the day. Once again, however, the opportunity for the extras was not to be successful.

Having had the upper hand the Dee now fell back into the malaise which had plagued them against better sides last season and let the opposition back into the game. Newry now exerted significant dominance, and maintained it, for the middle two quarters of the game. First of all a penalty was awarded and the Newry full-back converted. With the opposition now buoyed by their first points on the board they now produced excellent ball from all phases of play and their continuity stretched the Dee on a variety of fronts. On the stroke of half-time clever interplay on the Dee’s 10 metre line led to Newry’s powerful No. 10 breaking through run clear to score under the posts, The Dee faithful on the sideline were aghast at what looked like a clear final forward pass but the referee was happy and blew his whistle for half-time after the try had been converted to leave the score 10-10.

Newry again began strongly in the opening minutes of the second-half but were denied by stout Dee defence in which Mingout and Chris Hamilton were particularly prominent. Against the run of play Yellop gained possession halfway between the opposition 10 and 22 metre lines and barged his way through a succession of tackles and then outpaced the despairing Newry defence to complete his brace under the posts. With Cooper adding the extras the score now stood at 17-10 with 55 minutes played.

Newry again warmed to the task before them and, although suffering in the set scrums in which the also returning Chris Good was exerting his influence in the unaccustomed position of loose-head, they were gaining quality ball in many other phases of possession and eventually their impressive full-back opened the home defence to release his left-wing to score in the corner. The conversion was missed but, at 17-10 against, the opposition were on a high and looked as if they might well overcome the home side to take the game. The Dee’s problems were now compounded when, after a succession of penalties were conceded, Cooper received a “team” yellow card and the Dee were reduced to 14 men with 20 minutes left.

With normal No. 10 stand-in McBride off the pitch Davy Kirkpatrick assumed the unfamiliar mantle and his direct style of play lifted the Dee’s spirits and they began to threaten once again. On Cooper’s return to the field a passage of play took the Dee to the opposition 10 metre line before the mercurial Hamilton struck out for the line - a succession of hand-offs and side-steps ensued before he outpaced the tiring Newry defence to score beside the posts and secure the bonus point fourth try. Cooper converted and although Newry manfully tried to improve their scoreline the Dee managed the game to the final whistle running out victors by a margin of 24-15.

Given the changes in personnel and the quality of the opposition the coaching team will have been happy with the result but will be mindful of the weaknesses exposed during the game and will look to make improvements on the training paddock prior to the visit to Rafeenan next weekend to face a Monaghan side who have made a barnstorming start to their season.

A number of people put their hands up for Man of the Match this week including Morrow, Ingham, Hamilton and Stockton but, on this occasion, the award goes to Karl Yellop whose impact on the game at key times was to prove key in gaining the 5 points.

The other results in Round 2 of Championship Three were as follows:

Monaghan 62 Cavan 0
Civil Service 13 PSNI 0
Letterkenny 17 Holywood 29
Ophir 6 BHSFP 45
Strabane 19 Virginia 10

As noted above the 1st XV travel to Monaghan next Saturday with the team / supporters bus leaving Donaldson Park at 10:30am. If you would like to take advantage of the limited number of spaces left for supporters then please contact Peter Walker at p.walker@walkercommunications.co.uk

The 2nd XV open their league campaign at home to Clogher Valley III next Saturday (2:30pm ko) so, if you can’t get to Monaghan, please pop up to Donaldson Park and support Ryan Campbell’s men.