CBC senior schools rugby side advance to cup final after victory over Crescent in semi final

CBC 29

Crescent College Comprehensive 17

CBC will hope to make it third-ime lucky after securing a Munster Schools Senior Cup final return with a four-try victory over Crescent College Comprehensive at Thomond Park yesterday.

Similar to their junior cup success earlier in the day, they did so with two tries from a replacement winger with Bill McCarthy doing the honours. They await the winners of PBC or Castletroy College in the final.

Christians provided an early warning of their threat when Conall Cournane burned off five would-be tacklers but his offload didn’t go to hand for a finish.

They found the opener from their next attempt in the sixth minute. David Mac Coitir claimed the lineout and Cian Corkery made the initial carry before scrum-half Christopher Barrett stormed through a hole in the ruck defence to dive over. Charlie O’Shea’s conversion made it 7-0.

Crescent fought back and their hopes were boosted when the touch judge spotted a yellow-card offence against CBC hooker Darragh Prenter.

But a lineout malfunction let Christians off the hook and the remaining 14 managed their way through the sin-bin period.

Crescent’s maul was emerging as a major weapon and from that platform they almost crossed in the 22nd minute. Jayden Carmody was inches away from scoring before Charlie Fenton threw an out-the-back pass to Harry O’Halloran only for the ref to adjudge the ball had gone forward.

From another maul, the Limerick school got their reward in the 31st minute. Carmody sucked in a couple of defenders to create space for Fenton to send Gerry Joyce into the corner. Alan Cleary’s tricky conversion missed to leave a two-point deficit.

First

Christians would add another seven before the break. Prenter kept the ball alive from a five-metre lineout and they put the ball through the hands for Alex O’Connell to send McCarthy away to score with his very first touch.

O’Shea made it 14-5 at half-time.

A couple of impressive scrum moves almost released Barrett only for the final pass to go over his head on both occa

sions. The second time around, they recovered the loose ball and O’Shea’s crossfield kick found Prenter to score. O’Shea missed the conversion.

Christians almost pulled off an end-to-end try through Corkery, but his delayed pass to Barrett didn’t go to hand.

Crescent came again and Joyce looked to have scored a second try only for the touch judge to intervene over a second forward pass.

They did get their second try in the 58th minute. Leo O’Leary ripped the ball free from Crescent, but captain Ronan Ryan recovered and Darragh McKeogh bashed his way over. Cleary couldn’t add the conversion and the gap stayed at nine, 19-10.

Christians won a penalty straight from the restart, slotted by O’Shea, and they gained further insurance in the 64th minute.

From a scrum on halfway, O’Connell and Corkery’s offloads set them on their way. Another strong carry by Corkery got them to the line and O’Shea sent the ball wide for McCarthy to score before seizing up with cramp.

Crescent did muster a consolation try from an Alex McNamara pick and go with Cleary tagging on the conversion.

Scorers: CBC: Tries: B McCarthy 2, C Barrett, D Prenter; Cons: C O’Shea 3; Pen: C O’Shea. Crescent: Tries: G Joyce, D McKeogh, A McNamara; Con: A Cleary.

CBC: C Cournane; D O’Callaghan, L O’Leary, C Corkery, A O’Connell; C O’Shea (capt), C Barrett; R O’Callaghan, D Prenter, S Fitzpatrick; D Mac Coitir, R O’Sullivan; C Galvin, J O’Callaghan, I Morton.

Replacements: C Wallace, P O’Rourke, C Hughes, H McCarthy, M Manning, S Healy, Z Seymour, C Mulvihill, C Taylor, B McCarthy.

CRESCENT COLLEGE COMPREHENSIVE: F Rowsome; R Scanlon, E Cusack, H O’Halloran, G Joyce; A Cleary, A Clery; R Ryan (capt), A McNamara, C Enright; T Shanahan, J Carmody; D McKeogh, W Collins, C Fenton.

Replacements: M O’Brien, N O’Riordan, N Efe, O Copley, E Collins, D Obasa, W Byrne, R O’Connor, G Tobin, R Mullins.

Referee: P O’Connor (MAR).