THERE IS something magical about the regularity with which St Mary's College turn out creative attacking backlines. This was very much the basis for a Leinster Schools' Junior Cup second round five try whitewash of Castleknock College at Donnybrook yesterday.
St Mary's are determined to go one better than last year, when they went under to Belvedere in the final. Number eight Shane Jennings is the only survivor from that side and his explosive running provided St Mary's with direction and a sound platform for second phase possession.
The quickness with which the St Mary's forwards recycled the ball was an indication of their strength. Scrum half Fioan Henrey's passing was immaculate off either side. Outhalf David O'Sullivan ran his way to a hat trick of tries and had a hand in the other two. Centres Nigel Nagle and Michael Craig were fleet of foot and mind and right wing Cathal Connolly's muscular physique enabled him to brush off tacklers.
In the third minute, Henrey put O'Sullivan over on the blind side. Shortly after, left wing Stephen Hicks pounced on a loose ball at the halfway line and sped down the left touchline, his pass inside found O'Sullivan who galloped over from the 22 metre line. Connolly then made his only conversion of the afternoon and closed out the first half scoring with a 25th minute penalty.
St Mary's Nagle stretched his legs following O'Sullivan's half break and intuitive pass to make it to the right corner in the 33rd minute. Then two further tries came in the powerful form of Connolly and the nimble O'Sullivan completed his hat trick in the 48th minute.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)