PIFC: William Murphy seals a stunning Rockchapel comeback over Macroom

Rockchapel 1-12 Macroom 1-11

A ROUSING second-half earned Rockchapel the spoils in Round 1 of the Bon Secours Cork Premier IFC at Mallow. 

A result that didn’t look likely early on, but the 2020 IAFC champions rallied to outscore Macroom eight points to two after the break.

William Murphy was the hero with the winning point in the 64th minute.

Macroom made the better start with four unanswered points inside the first three minutes - stalwart Fintan Goold landing two.

Rockchapel settled through two Jack Curtin white flags but it didn’t take Macroom long to negate those scores. Their goalkeeper Brendan O’Connell coming to the rescue as well, when he saved from Jimmy McAuliffe.

Goold added his third point and he put his side further in front when he collected a pass from Dylan Twomey and made no mistake firing past Michael Geaney, 1-7 to 0-3 after quarter of an hour.

Rockchapel badly needed to do something to stay in the game, and the tonic they needed came from midfielder Seamus Hickey who curled a lovely shot into the top left corner.

Just as they started, the Muskerry side finished the half strong. Centre-back Sean Kiely roaming forward to kick a fine point. This was followed by another from their number eight Cillian Donovan to give them a 1-9 to 1-4 interval lead.

Jack Curtin was straight into the action and gave Rockchapel something to cheer about from the resumption, bearing down on goal his blasted effort narrowly over the bar. It was a signal of what was to come.

While Don Creedon pointed for Macroom, the Duhallow men roared into contention with six points in a row for the lead, 1-11 to 1-10.

David Horgan achieved deadlock, but Murphy found the winner.

Scorers for Rockchapel: S Hickey 1-1, J Curtin 0-3 (0-1 f), C Curtin (f), W Murphy 0-2 each, S Curtin, J O’Callaghan, N Lenihan, J McAuliffe 0-1 each.

Macroom: F Goold 1-3, D Horgan 0-2 (0-1 f), A Quinn, P Lucey, D Creedon, C Donovan, S Kiely, M Corrigan 0-1 each.

ROCKCHAPEL: M Geaney; B Carroll, E O’Callaghan, S Curtin; P Curtin, M O’Keeffe (c), K Collins; S Hickey, D O’Callaghan; W Murphy, M McAuliffe, J O’Callaghan; N Lenihan, J Curtin, J McAuliffe.

Subs: Cormac Curtin for N Lenihan (39), N O’Callaghan for P Curtin (56, inj).

MACROOM: B O’Connell; J O’Riordan, B O’Gorman, G Angland; R Buckley, S Kiely, M Corrigan; C Donovan, D Horgan; P Lucey (jc), M Cronin, D Creedon; F Goold, A Quinn, D Twomey.

Subs: T Dineen (jc) for P Lucey (41), E O’Leary for D Creedon (49).

Referee: Justin Murphy (Castletownroche).