Match report by Geoff Ingham

Donaghadee travelled to Pollock Park on Saturday to play Lurgan in their second league match of the season. The team sheet showed several changes from last week due to a mixture of unavailability and injury. Young Dylan Robinson came into the front row, filling the big boots of the suspended Ray Dobson. Jack Chesney moved up to Prop from the second row to replace Ali Barnes, captain Sam Ingham moving to the second row leaving room in the back row for the returning Chris Hamilton. Ben Beattie and Adam Whiteside (pictured) formed a youthful half-back partnership, with both Ali Lockhart and Mark Cooper on the injured list. Jody Newell made his first start for the Dee at centre due to the unavailability of Adam Alexander and was joined in the centre by Dicky Bailey. The evergreen Davy Skipp took a seat on the bench, accompanied by the youthful Bryn McCartney. Whereas last week the spectators were having to apply suncream, this week the brave souls who travelled to Lurgan had to don their waterproofs and hold umbrellas to cope with the atrocious weather conditions throughout the game. The Dee kicked off in the moist conditions and after only 10 minutes found themselves 14-0 down. The first try came after Dee were penalised at the first scrum. Lurgan kicked deep into the Dee 22 and from the resulting lineout a successful driving maul carried them over the line. Minutes later, after several phases of play, the scrum-half nipped round the side of a ruck to touchdown. Both tries were successfully converted and the Dee spectators feared they were in for a long day at the office. However, the Dee began to see more of the ball and tested the Lurgan defence on several occasions. Unfortunately, a couple of handling errors and wayward lineouts took the steam out of the attacks. On the 20- minute mark the Dee were penalised for a high tackle and the successful attempt at goal pushed the lead to 17 points. The Dee continued to share both territory and possession, with the forwards beginning to gain the upper hand in the scrums. After a clash of heads Dicky Bailey had to leave the field and was replaced by Bryn McCartney. A Lurgan player was then shown a yellow card for a high tackle but the Dee were not able to capitalise on the numerical advantage. In fact, it was the home team who scored next, on the stroke of half time, when the left winger beat several defenders to score under the posts to leave the half time score 24-0 in Lurgan’s favour.

The second half began in a similar fashion when the Dee were penalised just outside their 22 and the Lurgan centre slotted over the kick to increase the lead to 27-0. As the downpour continued both teams struggled to put together any significant phases of play and the match became a rather scrappy affair with both teams kicking away possession to try and gain territory. The Dee’s lineout improved significantly and, along with a strong scrum, allowed the Dee forwards to put together several useful phases of play. With 15 minutes to go Davy Skipp, who had just replaced the hard-working Johnny Gamble, drove hard towards the Lurgan 22, and from the ruck the effervescent Ben Beattie managed to dart through a gap and dived over to score. Although a losing bonus point was unachievable at this point the Dee were determined to deny Lurgan a bonus point for a fourth try and defended heroically in the last 10 minutes of the game to ensure that was the case as the referee blew for full time with the score at 27-5.

So, a difficult day for the Dee but there were plenty of positives when you consider that 8 of the squad were under 21 years of age. There was no lack of effort from anyone but the man of the match award this week goes to Dylan Robinson who rose to the challenge and put in an excellent 80 minutes both in the tight and in the loose. Next Saturday the Dee continue their league campaign when they entertain Portadown at Donaldson Park, kick off at 2.30pm.