Nine-goal battle ends in defeat for Amateurs Youth

Dromore Amateurs Youth U10's 3

DROMORE U10s were playing in the George Best U10 Youth Cup last Saturday. The cup is open to all U10 teams from various leagues, but Dromore got high-flying Ards Youth from their own league in the draw.

Dromore U10's have been playing really good football lately and they went into this match full of confidence.

Straight from kick-off Dromore showed their intentions for the game with some good attacking play and a couple of early chances fell to J Corbett and N Hamilton after some good play down the right flank from R Finlay and R Gallagher.

The young Dromore side were left shellshocked as Ards scored twice due to some indifferent goalkeeping from the Dromore keeper, who had been playing well in previous weeks.

The character of the young squad and the belief in their ability saw Dromore rally and with the back four of R Cobb, J Howard, B Johnston and C McCarthy now thwarting the Ards forwards with some good tackling, it allowed the attacking players to show their strengths.

With R Gallagher and M Brush winning the ball in midfield it allowed J Siviter and R Finlay to show their skills down both wings.

The home side were rocked when they conceded a goal and this was quickly followed by another to make the scoreline 2-2, the front pairing of N Hamilton and J Corbett getting rewarded for their hard work with closing the Ards defence down and after some neat interchanges found both Dromore forwards on the scoresheet.

Just as halftime was looming Dromore gave away a free-kick on the edge of their box; this resulted in Ards scoring to finish a frantic first half but a very good advert for youth football with both teams playing really well. The second half commenced with more of the same, both teams taking it in turns to attack.

It was Ards who scored first in the second half to make the score 4-2. Midway through the second half after a dribble from the halfway line saw R Finlay shooting from the edge of the box and finding the net to inspire hope and set-up a grand finale for the match.

This turned out to be a false dawn as Ards finished the stronger and ran out 6-3 winners after scoring two more goals.

On the day the George Best man of the match award went to J Siviter and the coaches man of the match award went to C McCarthy. The U10's resume league action next week away to Eddie Irvine, playing at Billy Neill playing fields with a 11am kick-off.