Loreto to meet Muckross in final

SCHOOLGIRL'S HOCKEY/Leinster Premier League, semi-finals:Reigning Leinster Premier League champions Loreto Beaufort will defend their crown in next Friday's final at Grange Road after beating St Andrew's 1-0 in yesterday's semi-finals. Their opponents will be Muckross Park, 2-0 winners over Wesley College, who lost to Beaufort at the semi-final stage last year.

Hermes' Anna O'Flanagan drove Muckross towards their defeat of Wesley, last season's beaten finalists, with the Ireland under-18 international at the centre of most of her school's best work. She opened the scoring after 10 minutes, finishing a swift counterattack after Muckross had been dispossessed, and helped make it 2-0 seven minutes later when, after her short corner strike was blocked, Ruth Dunne, on the right post, turned home the rebound.

Wesley fought desperately to find a goal to get back in to the game, and Rachel Scott twice came close from short corners, but could find no way through a well organised Muckross defence, in which Rachel O'Reilly and Jackie Murray excelled.

The second semi-final, played on a pitch struggling to cope with the late afternoon deluge, was a tighter affair, and looked destined for extra-time when Zara Delany, another under-18 international, deflected home a free from just outside the circle with five minutes to go.

MUCKROSS PARK: A Lambert, R O'Reilly, J Murray, L Dineen, A Lawless, D Doherty, A O'Flanagan, E Ward, R Dunne, M Morgan, G Coleman. Subs: A Reddan, A O'Reilly, E Conway, C Conway, S O'Loughrin.

WESLEY COLLEGE: S Davis, S Lyons, S Lewis, K Walsh, E Stafford, N Douglas, R Scott, L Pelow, K Willis, A Walker, S Taylor. Subs: H Clark, C Sweeney, K Motyer, H Honner, C Fitzpatrick.

LORETO BEAUFORT: J Duffy, Z Ennis, A O'Leary, M O'Dwyer, V Redmond, A Campion, H Matthews, S Noonan, Z Delany, R Maunsell, S Barnwell. Subs: P O'Dwyer, S McGirr, R Murphy, R Kelly, C O'Farrell.

ST ANDREW'S: T Ellis, J Donohoe, N Atchelor, R McFarlane, S O'Conaill, J Doran, Chloe Watkins, G Pinder, L Prentice, Courtney Watkins, S Woodroofe. Subs: H Meredith, L Kingston, V Taaffe, G Murphy, L O'Duffy.