U13s, Eddie Maher Memorial Tournament
31st August 2016
Our u13s set themselves a difficult challenge by entering the u14 Eddie Maher Memorial Tournament this past weekend.
Star players Hayden Quinn and James Byrne both shared their experience of the tournament, which was hosted by Albion Rovers FC.
Hayden Quinn
Today we played in the Eddie Maher memorial tournament. When we first arrived we all went down to the pitch to do our normal warm ups and we also did some stretches. Then we went to the pitch we were playing on.
Jonny told us the starting eleven . We went out expecting a very hard game as it was an U14 Tournament. We were playing well. There was some great play from the lads, Josh finished well with a volley , shortly after the ball was in the back of the net again, but it was disallowed for a off side. After 25 minutes the match ended 1-0 .
The next game was against Albion Rovers we played very well , again we went ahead earlier on and it finished 4-0 . We had a ten minute break until our next game . Next up we played Slane and we went ahead once again ,but Slane equalised from a penalty and the game ended 1-1.
We then went on to play knocklyon in the Semifinal, Oisín put the ball in the net but sadly again it was ruled out for off side .luckily we scored again and this time it counted , Knocklyon then scored from a free kick the game ended 1-1 which sent the game to penalties. They went first and Tom made a brilliant save which wouldn't have looked out of place in the premier league and it set us on our way , as Oisín stepped up the team grew in confidence, he then took the penalty a calmly slotted it away .They then missed their next one .James stepped up to take his with another calm finish .they scored next , Then Tristan scored, they missed their 4th which meant We won 3-1 . we didn't have to take our 4th or 5th we were over joyed with reaching our first Final in a tournament.
In the Final we would now face St Kevins U14 We unlucky went behind from a corner, from then on we took the game to St Kevins but we were very UNLUCKY not to equalise. We played well and made a few chances, the match ended 1-0 to St Kevins . We were all able to go home with our heads held high after a brilliant performance from all the lads .
Come on the Drog's bring on the new season 16/17 .
James Byrne
My name is James Byrne and on Sunday the 29th of August my team played in the Eddie Maher tournament under 14. I played centre mid for all 5 games. It was a very good competition for us as our team is under 13.
In the first game we played a team from Dundalk and win 1 nil which was a nice start for us.
In the second game we played against Albion rovers/ the hosts of the tournament so we really wanted to win. We started the game and stayed I their half for 10 minutes and got 2 goals. First goal scored by JJ on his left foot which set us on the attaching mode and we went in to score another 3 goals to when. 4-0.
In the third game we played against slane and we drew 1-1 but we win our group on goal difference and went through to the semi finals.
We played Knocklyon in the semi finals and were unlucky not to win because the ref wrongly called offside when Oisin scored a goal. We drew 1-1 and went to penalties. Our goal keeper Tom was in net first and pulled off an epic save which started us off brilliant and everyone screamed. Oisin was up to take the first penalty and tucked in away. Knocklyon were next and they hit the bar. I was up next and I really felt the pressure. Loads of thoughts went through my head but when I heard the whistle I knew where to go. I tucked it in the bottom left. I was delighted. Knocklyon scored the next one. Tristan was next and he buried his shot in the back of the net. Knocklyon missed the next one Tom was unreal. We were through to the final.
We tried our best against St Kevin's but we were very unlucky not to hit the net and finished in second place. We were still very happy with our performance.