DANSKE BANK MAGEEAN CUP FINAL
St Patrick’s Maghera v An Dún
Friday 7.30 – The Dub
FOR the first time ever, there won’t be an Antrim school in the Mageean Cup Final, when St Patrick’s Maghera cross sword with An Dún schools on Friday night.

An Dún is an amalgamation of a number of schools who don’t have numbers to compete in Mageean individually.

This will be their third final since the inception.  Their high-scoring tallies during the competition and defeating Cross and Passion will make them formidable opponents as Maghera go in search of title number 13.

have defeated the previous two winners in St Mary’s Belfast and St Louis Ballymena in the knockout stages after starting the league stages poorly. An Dún have been consistently the highest scoring team throughout their games played to date as they have garnered 20 plus scores in every game played so far.

The combination team have trained extensively together as the majority of their players are all part of the Down Hurling Development squad where they have played at Ulster level in the Celtic Challenge tournament.

Conor McCrickard is a mercurial talent from placed balls.  Eamon Kelly and Cathal Coulter form the spine of a very mobile and pacy defence while Phelim Savage and Caolan Coulter are perhaps the paciest midfield pairing seen in Schools hurling.

Tim Prenter is a key player, who showed the speed of hand to snatch the winning goal in stoppage time against Ballycastle.

This St Patrick’s group have gathered four of the five hurling titles available to them in their school careers.

The competition began poorly for St Patrick’s but they have improved as the games have gone on, remaining unbeaten since an opening day loss to CPC Ballycastle. The quarter-final win over St Mary’s Belfast brought their longest period of supremacy in the knock-out games but they have struggled to show the level of consistency which they will need if they are to account for An Dún on Friday night.

St Louis Ballymena led at half-time in the semi-final and it was only in the final ten minutes that St Patrick’s took control of that game also.

As ever they will need big performances of disciplined work-rate from their defence and midfield if they are to counter McCrickard ‘s threat from placed balls.

Liam McCann, Tiarnan Walsh, in the central positions, and the Quinn brothers Martin and Paddy will need to lead in this area. St Patrick’s will also need to more efficient with their use of possession but know if they can get Tiarnan McHugh, Ruairi Rafferty, Peadar McLaughlin and Richie Mullan more consistently in the game and playing more cohesively then they have the scoring power to damage the An Dún defence.

The more experienced St Patrick’s seek their 13^th title, while the more cohesive An Dún Schools will hope to be third time lucky as they seek to rewrite the Ulster Schools’ Hurling history books, on the evidence to date, don’t rule them out.

St  Patrick’s Maghera Squad: Ciaran Hendry (Lavey), Ryan Mulholland (Lavey), Liam McCann (Creggan), Oran McGill (Swatragh), Niall McNicholl (Kevin Lynch’s), Tiarnan Walsh (Swatragh), Fergal Ó Caiside (Slaughtneil), Martin Quinn (Swatragh), Paddy Quinn (Swatragh), Michael McCormack (Swatragh), Ruairi Rafferty (Kevin Lynch’s), Peadar McLaughlin (Swatragh), Padraig O’Kane (Kevin Lynch’s), Tiarnan McHugh (Kevin Lynch’s), Richie Mullan (Kevin Lynch’s), Conor Campbell (Banagher), Dominic Bradley (Swatragh), Fintan Bradley (Lavey), Cathair McGilligan (Banagher), Sean McCloskey (Slaughtneil), Martin Doherty (Swatragh), Emmett McKenna (Swatragh), Dara Simpson (Banagher), John Mellon (Slaughtneil), Sean Thomas McErlane (Slaughtneil), Tiarnan Farren (Kevin Lynch’s), Oisin McMullan (Slaughtneil), Odhran Melaugh (Lavey), Daniel McCormick (Moneyglass), Thomas McClarey (Kevin Lynch’s).

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