Éire Óg Greystones
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Weekly Notes - 20th September 2006

Such events are a great way for club mentors within the county to get to know one another, thereby ensuring that the rivalry between them is a wholesome, sporting one. They also help foster pride in the county.

The occasion was enjoyed by all and the Wicklow mentors were truly proud of their charges' efforts. Each player was given a jersey as a memento.

Hurling for u-10s and u-12s take places on Fridays at 6pm under the guidance of Cristina, Kate and Ronan. With the availability of the new hall in the club-rooms indoor hurling becomes an option in less clement conditions. These teams participate in competitions on Saturday mornings.

At Avondale on Wednesday before the proverbial two men and a dog in a game of quality, which truly deserved a larger viewing public, Éire Óg Greystones U-16s suffered a four-point defeat at the hands of Baltinglass in the championship.

The circumstance and manner of defeat might explain why the disappointment in the Éire Óg camp was not as great as might be expected from the result.

What we knew to be a difficult assignment in the first case took on everestian proportions with the news of the unavailability of three key players. But, nil desperandum, the to-all-appearances hopeless position in which our lads found themselves had the opposite to anticipated effect and instead of introducing the virus of despair stoked the fire of their resolve and they played "out of their skins". None more than Matthew Norman at centre-forward and the irrepressible Jonathan O'Brien, who impressed with their never say-die attitudes. Daniel Salmon's scoring return would suggest that he has found his niche at full forward.

Walking towards the carpark with a Rathnew supporter after our disappointing exit from the county minor championship on Saturday I posed what was, for me at least, the rhetorical question: "was that a game won or a game lost?" He agreed that Éire Óg had indeed let it slip. If games were won on the basis of the time spent by the ball in the opponent's territory we would have been clear-cut victors. Despite our territorial dominance our efforts were undone by the culmination of an off-day performance from our forwards - balls from scoreable positions that on other days would have sailed over the bar either fell frustratingly short into the hands of the excellent Rathnew goalkeeper or strayed agonisingly just off-target - and that vulnerability to the counterattack created by the opening up of space at the back when a team is attacking - the two Rathnew goals resulted from such situations.

The third quarter was a valley period for Éire Óg. During this period their play seemed to lose all sense of urgency and they tamely allowed Rathnew to build up a six-point lead. From then on it was all Éire Óg but the scores were still not coming. Then, with a few minutes to go, a Darren Hayden-inspired move culminated in a beautiful Daniel Webb goal. Game on! Too late? Just on the stroke of time one more chance presented itself. An Éire Óg forward obviously unaware of the all-or-nothing situation he was in opted for a point. The final whistle blew. A two point defeat.