Connacht Minor Football Championship Round 1

Tuam Stadium

GALWAY 4-18

ROSCOMMON 0-8

by Brían Mangan

A very strong Galway minor outfit had their hands full with a game Roscommon side until they blasted two rapid fire goals in first half stoppage time to put themselves in control of the match, a position from which they would never look back. Roscommon started well and were perhaps the better team in an open and entertaining first thirty minutes until two defensive lapses allowed Matthew Cooley to goal from a penalty, followed by an Aidan Halloran strike that put Galway firmly in the driving seat.

The half time scoreline of 2-5 to 0-5 certainly flattered the home team, but there was no question who the better team were in the second period as the Tribesmen put on an exhibition of kick passing, high fielding and score taking to run out comfortable winners. Halloran and Cooley added another goal each in the second half and there were also impressive performances by Ryan Monahan, Tony Gill and Paul Kelly in particular. For the Rossies Ruaidhrí Fallon at centre back and Liam Ormsby, Shane Cunnane and James Fitzpatrick had fine games, never allowing their heads to drop despite the scoreline.

The Galway management will be thrilled with their spread of scorers throughout the 60 minutes as 9 different players impacted the score board for them. Roscommon will be able to take some optimism from the fact that they were every bit as good as Galway for the first period of the game and they certainly showed in that spell that they have the potential to have a successful campaign in the round robin format, in spite of this disappointing result.

Round 2 of the Connacht Minor Championship takes place next Friday night the 11th of May, with the Rossies hosting Mayo in Kiltoom and Galway travelling to Markievicz Park to play Sligo, both at 7pm.

GALWAY: D Halloran, C Halbard, S Black, C Deane, R Monohan (0-4fs), T Gill, C Sweeney (0-1), P Kelly (0-2), C Raftery (C) (0-1), L Judge, A Halloran (2-2), O McCormack, O Gormally (0-4, 0-1f), D Cox (0-1), M Cooley (2-2, 1-0 pen) SUBS: E Tinney (0-1), E McCormack, J McLoughlin, R McSweeney, D Joyce, O Dooley

ROSCOMMON: D Connolly, S Trundle, D Gaughan, K Gunning, R Dolan, R Fallon, J Lohan, E Crawley, J Hester, A McDermott (0-2, 0-1f), L Ormsby (0-1), E Derwin (0-2), F Lennon (0-1), S Cunnane (0-2fs), J Fitzpatrick SUBS: N Moran, C Brogan, C Carthy, D Murray, R Walsh, J Browne