UCD showed little interest in prolonging their season in the Leinster Senior Cup debacle against County Carlow at Belfield yesterday.
From the early stages the students bombarded Carlow with wave after wave of attack. However, Carlow's out half Robert Byrne caught College cold when he skipped in for a try in the fourth minute. Amazingly, he missed the conversion from in front of the posts. Byrne kicked poorly from four penalty attempts. However, the Carlow players did not miss tackles, save for odd bamboozling gallop from Cantwell or Brian O'Driscoll.
Indeed, O'Driscoll eventually got his side in front with a try which Hugh McMahon converted.
UCD should have gone on from there but Carlow full back, Matt Waterhouse, chased a cleverly flighted chip to collect and score under the posts for Byrne to add the points and a 12-7 win. Barnhall took the scalp of Bective Rangers courtesy of a 78th minute drop goal from out half Conrad Burke.
The junior champions went into a 21-0 lead with three converted tries. But, they were ominously hauled back by Bective until a James Hardy try, converted by Warren Johnson, reduced the deficit to 29-26. At that point, it could have gone either way and Barnhall's bravery was a valuable asset in the tight finish.
Greystones were always in control of their dual with Old Belvedere at Anglesea Road. They were 10-0 ahead early on and maintained their advantage to the end with Dan McGettigan proving their match winner with a couple of tries.
Terenure College came from 133 down at half time to overtake Old Welsey at Donnybrook. Wing Alastair Howell was the Wesley try scorer and out half David Smith kicked the touchline conversion as well as two penalties.
Wesley wilted in the face of incessant second half pressure. Centre Michael Smyth went over and Billy Treacy had the other try and converted to bring Terenure within a point of the lead. His second penalty was enough to seal an 18-16 victory.
The long delayed Munster Senior Cup was thrown into further confusion by a mundane draw between Bruff and Waterpark. Liam Dooley kicked Bruff into a 15th minute lead and Eoin Hogan equalised on half time in a sterile 3-3 draw. In Ulster, Dromore attempted to cross a `bridge too far' when Instonians came to Barban Hill. Inst' ended the eighty minutes with six tries and a facile 39-20 victory. North gave Banbridge a glimpse of what life in the higher divisions is like in a 36-8 win at Rifle Park and City of Derry ran out comfortable 29-15 winners over Omagh Academicals at Judges Road.
Buccaneers showed all the signs of a league hangover from the week before in the Connacht Senior Cup semi-final at Athlone. They fell 21-0 behind Ballina with two tries coming from Irish Under 19 Ger Brady before reality set in. After that the pack was back to it's dominant self as Ballina were trampled underfoot. Martin Cahill, Colm Rigney and Martin Cahill were among the tries as Philip Lynch accumulated 24 points in a 49-21 win.
