Good start for Tallaght rugby women’s

TALLAGHT Rugby Club women’s team played their opening match of the season last weekend against the Three Saints.

Three Saints are made of an amalgamation of players from St Mary’s, Guinness and DLSP. The pitch at Tymon Park was deemed unplayable by the council so the match was moved to St Mary’s ground at Templeville Road.

The Saints would dominate the first quarter of the game as Tallaght struggled to make it out of their half as they played into a strong wind.

Luckily the defence held out well and prevented the Saints from generating any major lead.

Megan McGuinness produced a fantastic cover tackle to prevent what seemed a certain try.

The only luck The Saints would have would be converting a penalty which gave them a 3-0 lead.

Slowly Tallaght started to come into the game themselves however with Adriana Silvela, Martina Fitzpatrick and Samantha Ledden all making strong ball carries and generating some forward momentum.

Megan McGuinness would be on hand again to produce a magic moment after a move from Louise Leonard-Flood, Abbie Keeley and Aisling Pyke left her open and in space to score the first try of the game giving Tallaght a 5-3 lead.

Tallaght would double this lead shortly after this time through Louise Leonard Flood.

Abbie Keeley would kick an excellent conversion to give Tallaght a 12-3 lead at halftime.

The Saints would try to regain some momentum in the start of the second half but Tallaght held firm with Eileen Shanahan and Kim Littlefield working overtime in the tackle count.

Full back Sorca Burns was constantly forced to field long kicks but she ran them back bravely.

Niamh Moore came on and put in her usual hard hits making her presence known.

Still The Saints were competing well and looked like they were threatening to score a try until a clever interception from Lousie Leonard-Flood.

She moved the ball up the pitch trapping The Saints inside their own half for the final ten minutes of the game.

Eventually the pressure became too much and Grainne Leonard-Flood would score a try under the posts, scoring the conversion herself to secure a 19-3 victory for Tallaght.

Tallaght head coach Adam Nolan was delighted for his team to start the season with a win.

“We weren’t able to play a preseason game so after a slow start today, we really started to play and secured a good win.

‘We worked very hard on both sides of the ball and, though there are areas to improve, it was an excellent all round performance for the first run-out of the season.”