St Mary’s finish strongly to beat Fermanagh

St Mary's 3-8 Fermanagh 1-10

A strong finish helped St Mary's to a surprise victory over Fermanagh in the McKenna Cup last night. The students scored 1-2 in the last two minutes, the goal from substitute Aidan McGarrity, in the dense fog at Brewster Park. Seamie Quigley hit five early points as Fermanagh coasted into a 0-6 to 0-0 lead after 20 minutes.

St Mary's were slow to settle. Conor McCann scored a goal for the students in the 23rd minute to get them going. Former Tyrone minor star Thomas Canavan scored two brilliant left-footed points from play and Armagh panellist Aidan Forker was also on target as the visitors led 1-5 to 0-6 at the break.

Canavan, a nephew of former Fermanagh boss Peter, helped to inspire the students when he converted a free and then drilled St Mary’s second goal into the roof of the net after 50 minutes.

Fermanagh had a good last quarter, Seamie Quigley converting a penalty he won himself after St Mary’s defender Niall Donnelly pulled him down, which resulted in the only black card of the game in the 57th minute.

Quigley then fired over a monster free to put Fermanagh briefly back in the lead before the students’ lively finish.

FERMANAGH: C Snow; J Woods, N Cassidy, M O'Brien; D McCusker, B Mulrone, C Quigley; R Jones (0-1), S McElrone; T Daly, N McIlroy, C Jones (0-1); R Ormsby, Seamie Quigley (1-7, 1-0 pen, 0- 2f), P McCusker. Subs: Sean Quigley (0-1) for N McElroy (43), J Love for C Jones (43), M McAleer for Daly (59), A Boyle for P McCusker (65).
ST MARY'S: D McAnenly; A Maguire, N Donnelly, M Murray; C McCann (1-0), R Loughran, C McMahon (0-1); P Carragher (0-1), E Bradley; R O'Callaghan (0-1), A Forker (0-1), J Duffy; B O'Hagan, B Hasson (0-1), T Canavan (1-3, 0-1f). Subs: R Sexton for Bradley, R Johnston for McCann (both 44), A McGarrity (1-0) for O'Hagan (51), K McKernan for Donnelly (58), T McCaffrey for Duffy (67)
Referee: P Hughes (Armagh).