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Churchill Utd 0-1 Draperstown Celtic

January 28, 2008

Draperstown Celtic’s progression up the Intermediate league took another massive step on Saturday when they defeated league leaders Churchill Utd at Wilton Park. Following on the heels of the excellent victory achieved at Newbuildings in their previous outing, Celtic were not in the mood to let the impetus created there slip away.

They could have won by more had they taken some of the four or five good opportunities they created and yet right at the death, Smallwoods could have grabbed an equaliser but blazed his effort over the bar.

Celtic began brightly and, playing with the wind, had Churchill on the back foot for large parts of the first half. This early pressure was rewarded by the only goal of the game in the tenth minute when Colin Murray scored from 8 yards after Burns had flicked on Declan Graffin’s throw. Celtic looked to add to their advantage and almost did so five minutes later when John Higgins’dribble inside the box fed Seamus Bradley whose first time shot was well saved by Deeny in the home nets. Little was seen of Churchill as an attacking force in this opening period and they owed a great deal to keeper Deeny who, in the 30th minute pulled off a great save, again from Bradley, who was wonderfully set up by Eamon Burns’ mazy run. As it was, the one goal advantage remained and slowly the home side began to make progress into the Celtic half. They almost pinched an equaliser on half time when they threatened the Celtic goal with a series of corners. Eoin McNicholl saved well from Devine and later Smallwoods’ header just cleared the bar.

The second half saw an almost reversal of the first as Churchill upped the pressure in search of an equaliser. However despite having a great deal of possession, McNicholl in the Celtic goals was rarely troubled such was the dominance of the visitors’ back four again well led by Quinn and McKillion, while Graffin put in a solid display in mid-field. David Scanlon fired over from a free kick on 54 minutes while a great recovery tackle from Colin Murray prevented Smallwoods from scoring. However, Celtic had their chances to increase their lead. Gary Conway was taken down outside the box and Eamon Murray thumped the resultant free against the cross bar with Deeny a spectator. Ten minutes later with Celtic again playing on the break, Murray latched onto a poor back pass but was forced wide by Deeny and the Churchill defence recovered to clear what should have been a further goal.

With time running out for Churchill they did put the Celtic team under a great deal of pressure. They were awarded numerous free kicks but a mixture of poor delivery and poor finishing meant that McNicholl was not called into any serious action though the blanket defence was almost at breaking point on occasions. Smallwoods should have scored for the home side when on 89 minutes when for the only time of the game he got beyond Celtic’s defence but blasted over from close range and with it went Churchill’s last real chance. The referee saw fit to play five minutes injury time which again saw some last ditch and at times nervous clearances from Celtic but when the final whistle did come it brought much celebration from the team and their bench.

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Written by Michael Kelly · Filed Under First Team, News