Our juvenile hurlers earned a second excellent win against their London counterparts at the weekend. Read a review of the game below, courtesy of our CDA: Dermot Thornton.
Hurling Juvenile Development Squad Challenge
London vs Warwickshire @McGovern Park, Sunday 19th March 2023
Two weeks on from their victory in Birmingham, our Juvenile Hurling Development squad travelled to London for the return fixture against their London counterparts.
The game was played as a curtain raiser to the National League fixture between London and Meath. Huge thanks to our hosts for setting this up and for the excellent hospitality on the day. The Ruislip facilities and pitch were in top condition and coupled with the favourable weather, our lads were allowed the opportunity to display their talents and skills. Both teams came out of the blocks with real intent as the sliotar was pucked over and back with some excellent blocking and hooking preventing early scores on the board.
It was Warwickshire who struck first with a rocket of a goal from Seamus Owens in the 6th minute, Hughie Boxwell followed immediately with a customary long-range point. These opening scores settled the lads down and they soon found their stride with further goals coming from Daire McBride and Tom Mulkeen.
While our scoring efficiency was increasing at one end, our defending was equally as impressive at the other. Cormac Cotter making a key interception to keep London out. In the closing stages of the first half, Austin Roche produced a piece of individual brilliance to carry the ball from his own half and flick the ball over a defender before slotting over the bar. Ethan Mee topped off a fine first half team performance with a long range point on the stroke of half-time.
The Warwickshire lads started the second half as they ended the first, Ethan adding another point before a 5 minute hat-trick from Seamus Owens put the visitors out of sight. Two excellently taken scores from Daragh Gantley, as well as further scores from Hughie, Ethan (3) and Daire kept the scoreboard ticking over.
In the closing stages, our goalkeeper Alfie came out of goal to get himself on the scoreboard before Ethan topped off the performance with an individual score the Gooch (with the bigger ball) would have been proud of. After losing his hurley in the tackle, he managed to beat 3 players before kicking the ball over the bar from the 21.
This was another impressive performance and convincing victory for our lads. Going to London and winning is never easy but all credit to this group of players and the management team who are continuing to go from strength to strength and who will no doubt play a big part in shaping the future of hurling in Warwickshire.
The Warwickshire Panel:
- Hughey Boxwell
- Ethan Mee
- PJ Spencer
- Alfie Clark
- Leo Sweeney
- Ryan Brough
- Daragh Devlin
- Austin Roache
- Daragh Gantley
- Tom Nash
- Tommy Power
- Daire McBride
- Tom Mulkeen
- Owen Lynch
- James Yates
- Joe Quinn
- Cormac Cotter
- Seamus Owens
- Tom Sweeney
