Donaghadee welcomed Lurgan to Donaldson Park on Saturday for a Kukri Championship 2 League game. With Jack Chesney and Paul Hamilton unavailable due to work and injury respectively, Dylan Robinson started at prop and Bryn McCartney moved into hooker. Padric Ahern and Chris Hamilton returned to the backrow and Chris McGivern played on the left wing. Youngsters Curtis Ewing and Noah Greenald occupied the bench. Thankfully the pitch had defrosted enough to allow play to go ahead although the moist surface was going to make handling difficult for both teams. Lurgan kicked off and after only 2 minutes the Dee had their first chance when Ahern broke blind and looked to send Robbie Ingham down the wing. However, a Lurgan hand intervened and the cries for a deliberate knock on were ignored and the chance was gone. The Dee continued to enjoy the majority of possession and managed to open the scoring in the 17th minute. Chris McGivern offloaded to Adam Alexander who escaped the Lurgan defensive line but was brought down agonisingly short of the line. Lurgan infringed at the ruck and the ball was moved wide and Ahern managed to muscle his way over to score. The difficult conversion was missed to leave the score 5-0 to the Dee. This seemed to spur Lurgan on and for the next 10 minutes they tested Dee’s defence. Solid tackling by the likes of Callaghan and Ingham kept them at bay until just before the half hour mark when the Lurgan prop forced his way over after several phases of play to level the scores. It was then the Dee’s turn to put together a number of scoring opportunities with both Ahern and Robinson stopped close to Lurgan’s line. Lurgan were penalised for a deliberate knock on and Cooper punished them by slotting over the kick to put the Dee back into the lead. On the stroke of half time Dee gave away a needless penalty on the half way line. This ill-discipline cost them dearly as Lurgan kicked deep into the Dee 22 and a couple of phases after the line out the forwards scored in the corner. This time the conversion was successful to leave the half time score 12-8 in the visitor’s favour. Curtis Ewing replaced the injured Lockhart for the second half, Ben Beattie moving to the scrum half position. The Dee started strongly and spent the first 20 minutes in Lurgan’s half. Strong driving by Hamilton, Barnes and Boyd put the Dee in good positions but a combination of good Lurgan defence and inaccuracy from the Dee meant that the score remained unchanged. A clothes-line tackle in the Lurgan 22 saw their rather relieved fullback only penalised. Dee chose to run the penalty and a long pass to Ewing on the wing saw him cross the line only for the referee to disallow the try as he judged the pass to be forward. Despite this harsh decision the Dee continued to attack the Lurgan line. Cooper was successful with a couple of 50-22s and as the game entered the final quarter the Dee went ahead. A kick into the 22 was gathered by Lurgan but pressure by Ewing and McGivern allowed Ahern to win the ball back. After a strong Barnes drive Beattie slipped the ball to Boyd who crashed over the line to give the Dee a one-point lead. With ten minutes to go Lurgan had a rare trip into the Dee half and unfortunately the Dee conceded another needless penalty which allowed Lurgan to progress into the Dee’s 22. After several phases the Lurgan centre forced his way over the line.
The successful conversion pushed Lurgan 19-13 ahead. Although the Dee had most of the possession in the final ten minutes Lurgan’s defence stood firm and the final whistle was blown without any more changes to the scoreboard. Although the Dee earned a valuable losing bonus point, not for the first time this year they were left to reflect what might have been. Although this was an overall good performance, improved discipline and better game management would lead to better results. Ahern, Barnes, Beattie and Boyd were all contenders for man-of-the-match but for the second week in a row the award goes to Robbie Grant who put in another excellent all-round performance. Next week Dee travel to Glynn to play Larne, K.O. 2.30 pm.