Donaghadee welcomed league leaders Carrick on Saturday to a sticky but eminently playable Donaldson Park. With Max Montgomery & Owen Roberts unavailable and both Matthew Johnston and Andy McGrugan injured Paul Hamilton, Matthew Kennedy, Andy Jarvis and Tommy Scullion came into the squad.

Although Carrick started strongly playing towards Newtownards a penalty chance was missed before they got off the mark through another Dee offence in the tenth minute to allow the Co. Antrim side to take a 3-0 lead. Donaghadee now applied the pressure and were rewarded when, in the space of three minutes Mark Cooper licked two penalties to allow the lead to change in favour of the home side and nudge them into a 6-3 advantage. With their tails up Donaghadee continued to press and on twenty six minutes No. 9 Chris Scott broke on halfway to feed back row Chris Hamilton who made twenty metres before chipping ahead towards the Carrick line. The away side were caught securing the ball over their own line and a five metre scrum in favour of the Dee ensued. Unfortunately a mix-up on the pick-up led to Carrick clearing their lines. The Dee continued to attack through the maul which was working well led by Jack Cooke, Paul Hamilton and Chris Good and made good progress until a penalty was won. From the following lineout close to the Carrick line the Dee looked more than likely to score but once again stout Carrick defence overturned the ball and they made their way back up into Dee territory. As Carrick attacked the Dee line Scott was yellow carded for going in at the side and Carrick opted to go to touch after which they were repelled by stand-out Dee defence and in particular a trademark bone shuddering & try-saving tackle from Bill Allen. Carrick were not to be undone though and won a succession of five metre scrums. With the sticky surface proving difficult for the Dee eight in face of the well-drilled Carrick drive, aided by their penchant for an early push which went undetected all afternoon, the referee lost patience and a penalty try was awarded and the extras kicked to leave the score at the turnaround 10-6 in favour of the visitors.

In the second half Carrick turned the screw with the advantage of the elements and the incline on their side and in the fifty third minute they won ball off the top of lineout on the Dee twenty two and fed ball in the centre to their rampaging second row who shook off two tackles before offloading to his No. 8 who crossed for his side’s second try of the afternoon. The conversion was added and the score now stood at 17-6 to the visitors. Although the Dee threatened on occasion with Paul Johnston, Cooke, the two Hamiltons and Conn Crawford to the forefront the impressive Carrick defence stood firm and, having withstood the Dee advance, a penalty took them back to the opposing line where Cooke was somewhat harshly adjudged to have killed the ball on the floor and sent to the bin for the statutory ten minutes. Carrick opted for the scrum and, with Donaghadee suffering from the loss of the big lock, the visitors gained a pushover try. Aided by another conversion Carrick now led by 24-6 with five minutes of the game left to play. The Dee now played “catch-up” rugby and in the fifth minute of injury time were looking as if they just might get a consolation score. Unfortunately the Carrick scrum-half was allowed to come around the side of a ruck in an offside position, gathered the ball and, with fullback Allen out of the game with cramp and left winger Jarvis caught in the ruck, he outpaced the despairing Dee defence to make the line for an unconverted but nevertheless bonus point try leaving the final score a maybe somewhat flattering 29-6 in favour of the league leaders.

There can be no argument that the stronger side won on the day. Carrick are a big, well drilled side and their pack will cause many other sides problems with their robust set piece and competitive back row – we wish them well in their quest for Qualifying One rugby in this their 150th anniversary season. As far as the Dee are concerned the side will realise that their effort perhaps deserved a little more reward on a day when much favoured the visiting side but, at the same time, they will also know that the main difference was that Carrick came away with points when they visited the red zone. A number of players stood out for the Dee, not least Kennedy, Cooke, Crawford, Chris & Paul Hamilton and Johnston but Man of the Match this week goes to skipper and hooker Gareth Gordon (pictured) whose efforts week in, week out often go unnoticed and whose display yesterday in the tight, maul and defence was exemplary.