LAST SEASON Old Crescent were sheltered from the demands of top flight rugby on the comfort couch of Division Two. The Limerick club sailed through the season undefeated. On Saturday, they were exposed to a new experience at Templeville Road.
The absence of influential flanker Len Dineen and the late omission of centre Leo Doyle must have disrupted Old Crescent's preparations. Into the centre came Anthony O'Dwyer - a brother of coach Jed O'Dwyer - who suffered the misfortune of a dislocated kneecap with 10 minutes remaining.
At this point, Old Crescent trailed 34-21 and this unfortunate incident was enough to exhaust any glimmer of an unlikely comeback. Although left wing Paul McDonagh had made the best use of Barry O'Neill's long, floated pass to get in at the corner moments earlier, Old Crescent had introduced their full complement of replacement backs. So, second choice hooker Mick O'Meara took to the centre.
Near the end, nippy St Mary's scrum half, Eoin McCormack, inched his frame over the line from a five metre scrum. Out half Feargal Camp ion made up for missing the conversion with a penalty deep into injury time that consigned Old Crescent to a harrowing defeat.
Of course, St Mary's are much lauded for the way they like to play and the new binding rule for back rows at scrum suits their expansive style. Indeed, Leinster wing Denis Hickie set up one try for colleague David Lyons (20 minutes), before turning the Crescent defence inside out on a 60 metre dash down the right touchline for his own touchdown. Campion converted the second of these on his way to an impressive haul of 22 points. This gave St Mary's 15-8 lead after 26 minutes.
Sandwiched between Hickie's dazzle was a mauling try from Crescent's John Forde.
When Nowlan won the race to his own kick ahead, Campion slotted the conversion and quickly added a penalty. Begley's second penalty closed out the first half scoring to leave St Mary's 28-11 in front.
Old Crescent made a better fist of things on the turnover with a try from number eight David Bowles. But, Campion split the posts from two penalties and St Mary's were back in control again.
As expected St Mary's Coach Ciaran Fitzgerald was pragmatic in victory. "It will be a long hard campaign and I'm just delighted to have gotten passed the first round. It was pleasing that we scored four tries. It proves that we have options", he said.
Old Crescent Coach Jed O'Dwyer felt his side's downfall was largely self inflicted. "I am very disappointed especially with our first half showing".
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)