St Jude’s cruise by Balinteer

St Jude’s cruise by Balinteer

By Hayden Moore

ST JUDE’S secured a emphatic  3-22 to 0-15 win over Ballinteer St John’s in the opening round of the Senior ‘A’ Hurling Championship in O’Toole Park on Sunday.

Even Aodhán Clabby’s 0-9 tally was not enough for St Johns to see off their Templeogue opponents as Danny Sutcliffe and Fionn Ó Riain Broin chalked up 2-8 between them in a rip-roaring encounter.

St Judes V Ballinteer 04

While all eyes turned to Parnell Park for Ballyboden St Enda’s and Kilmacud Crokes respective championship openers, Jude’s stole the show against Ballinteer in Group Two.

Eamonn Kelly’s men kicked their campaign off with a bang as intercounty star centre-forward Sutcliffe dominated the exchanges from early on.

Clabby kept St John’s in the race with some laser-accurate placed balls down the other end, but by the half-time interval they sat four-points adrift.

An asser-tive Donie Fox saw him fire over a brace from midfield while Tom Delvin also managed 0-4 from play to send Jude’s into a 0-11 to 0-7 half-time lead.

Ballinteer where fired up after the break and struck three unanswered points to reduce the deficit to the minimum.

Glenn Whelan, Danny McCarthy and substitute Seamus Fenton were the ones to split the posts before Sutcliffe stepped up and struck 1-1 for Kelly’s side.

Despite Donal Gormley and Cormac O’Brian’s brilliant first-half display in the backline, it was not enough to prevent John Carthy from registering four scores at centre-forward.

With Mark Maguire dominant at centre back and helping Ross O’Reilly maintain a clean sheet in between the posts, he rattled St John’s net down the other end while Manus Malone fired over to extend Jude’s lead.

Goalkeeper O’Reilly pulled off two classy saves while Ó Riain Broin brought his tally to 1-4 for the afternoon.

Ballinteer did manage three more points before the end, all from Clabby frees, but another Sutcliffe moment of magic closed out the affair when he glanced the sliotar over from a tight-angle out wide.

The 16-point win sees St Jude’s in second place on the group table as they prepare for their encounter with Cuala next Wednesday.

Elsewhere, current Group One leaders Faughs will travel to Parnell Park on Wednesday evening to face Na Fianna in the next round having beaten O’Tooles 3-18 to 2-15 in the last round.

The next round of the Senior ‘B’ Championship will not be played until the May Bank Holiday weekend when St Patrick’s look to bounce back from their 4-24 to 1-9 loss to new group leaders Crumlin and Ballyboden St Enda’s B team take on the frontrunners while Thomas Davis welcome Naomh Olaf.

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