ROC Celtic fall short in UCFL Division 3A shield title final

ROC CELTIC failed in their attempt to defend their UCFL Division 3A Shield title, when they fell short by going down to a very good Malawi FC in the final last Saturday in VEC Terenure reports John Mooney.

Malawi won 4-2 on the day and were full value for their win, as they took their chances when they were presented with them.

No disrespect to Malawi meant here but ROC never really got out of the traps, had a player dismissed just before the half time break and were left chasing the game.

By the time the opening goal arrived, barely 10 minutes in, Malawi could have been two goals in front but for some wild efforts.

That gave ROC a bit of confidence and on nine minutes they were in front, after Dylan Hayden floated over a free kick that Jamie Wade headed home.

But that lead lasted just five minutes as Ato Kwamena latched onto a through ball from Eric Tetteh, rounded keeper Peter Maxwell and slipped the ball into the net.

Luke Finnegan of ROC Celtic lunges into a tackle on Malawi FC’s Shanks Kaunda Photos by John Mooney

They made it 2-1 on 20 minutes as keeper Charles Branda played the ball down field, Griffin Michael headed on and Tetteh raced away from the ROC defence to smash home.

ROC chased and harried to get back into the game, but their effort was dampened when Luke Finnegan got his marching orders just before half time.

If anything that spurred on the ROC lads and just after the restart they were back on level terms, when Wade netted their second.

I thought they might have pushed on from that, despite only having 10 players on the field, but Malawi gathered themselves and regained the lead 65 minutes through Shanks Kaunda.

It wasn’t what ROC wanted and when Joshua Gama made it 4-2 soon after, it was always going to end in victory for them.

However, on the bright side ROC have two games left in order to win the league, so there could be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow after all for them.

ROC CELTIC: P. Maxwell, A. Curran, D. Mooney, D. Hayden, J. Layton, E. Kearney, L. Finnegan, L. Joyce, J. Wade, E. Harmon, O. Gavin, D. Kavanagh, A. Murphy, C. Fox, T. Connors, A. Maguire, D. Shelvin.