SCHOOLS' RUGBY: Dalriada beat Dromore High in Schools' Cup third round

Dromore's Aaron Lyttle in action with Dalriada's M Kennedy

Dalriada started to gather momentum in attack as they went through the phases.

Prop, William Allen, threw a pass to set up winger, Peter Wright, to score an unconverted try in the corner to give his side a 5-0 lead.

Dromore were penalised for offside at the ruck and the decision was made to go for the posts. Dalriada hooker, James McCormick, made no mistake with his kick to give his team an 8-0 lead.

In the final minutes of the first half Dalriada’s discipline started to turn against them as they were caught offside a number of times.

Eventually, they were penalised in front of the posts and Reuben Cobb, the impressive Dromore outhalf, stepped up to convert the penalty to leave his side trailing 3-8 at the break.

After the restart second-Row, Nathan Phillipson, gathered the ball and offloaded to James McCormick who made a run up the middle of the pitch and was taken down just outside the Dromore ‘22’.

A few phases later winger, Ross Fallows, made a blistering run down the line only for his try to be disallowed try for a foot in touch.

A Dalriada line out just outside the Dromore ‘22’ area, led to an attack lasting a few phases. Quick ball resulted in Dalriada centre, Luke Pollock, making a line break and scoring a try. McCormick added the extras to increase the lead to 15-3.

Dromore had a great ten minutes with Ben Heath, Aaron Lyttle and Peter O’Connor leading from the front.

A series of lineouts on the Dalriada line ended when Aaron Lyttle forced his way over to touch down for an unconverted try and a penalty from Cobb made it 11-15.

Dromore, at this stage, pressed for more points but unfortunately turned the ball over on a number of occasions.

Dalriada then had a great line break from James McCormick and he set Ross Fallows up to run in for a try, McCormick added the conversion to increase the Dalriada lead to 22-11.

Dromore fought hard with players such as Dean Dillon, Tom Dologhan and Cameron Beacom-Hurle all asking questions of the Dalriada defence.

However, the Dalriada defence survived the onslaught and a line break by Luke Pollock, who was caught just short of the line, allowed McCormick to squeeze in for an unconverted try which secured the 27-11 win for the Ballymoney boys.