Park started their U17 league campaign with a win away against Killarney Celtic. We started the brightest of the two sides with Aaron ward going close in the opening minutes after a great cross from Kevin Brown. From a long kick out by Jack Rodgers we got our opening goal when Conor O’Brien got in behind the Athletic defence where he was taken down with the referee awarding a penalty. John Ward made no mistake with the resulting spot kick to give us a deserved lead.
We continued to press forward and could have doubled our lead when Aaron Ward, Conor O’Brien and Jack Donoghue all went close. Ten minutes before the break we did double our lead when a corner from Conor O’Brien was met by the head of Jack O’Donoghue only to see his header crash back of the post but Kevin Brown reacted quickest to finish the ball home .
Just before the half time break Athletic were awarded a penalty. Jack Rogers in the park goal guess correctly and dived full length to his left hand side to make a fantastic save and to send us away on a counter attack where Aaron Ward slipped the ball through to Culan Sweeney who goes through on goal and slots the ball past the advancing keeper to leave us 3-0 up at the break.
The second half was once again dominated by the Park and we could have added more goals on a different day with Shane Jordan, Conor Higgins, James O’Connor and Culan Sweeney all going close with Culan being the closest when his effort hit the crossbar. We were well on top through out the second half with out adding to the lead while also maintaining our clean sheet.
Managers and coaches Dave, Jim and George were very please with the performance of all the players and it’s great to get a win in our first game of the season.
Team; Jack Rodgers, Mike Lacey, Kevin Brown, Aaron Ward, Dean Scanlon, Conor O’Brien, Shane Jordan, Culan Sweeney, Jack Donohhue, James O’Connor, Conor Higgins, John Ward, Merland Xhemaili .
Goal scorers; John Ward, Kevin Brown, Culan Sweeney .
Man of the match ; Jack Rodgers .
