Derrygonnelly 0-11 Belcoo 1-07 Belcoo may have seen their poor run of results continue on Friday night but manager Peter Clarke will feel that there was more positives to take out of this narrow defeat to league leaders Derrygonnelly than there was from most of their recent games in the league programme.

The O’Rahillys set out to frustrate Derrygonnelly and for long parts they succeeded in this but ultimately Paul Ward’s late point left them empty handed once again while the Harps continue to set the pace at the top of the table despite being without a number of key performers.

With the league now at the halfway stage Martin Greene’s Harps outfit sit three points clear at the top ahead of Erne Gaels and it was the character that his side displayed on Friday night that pleased him most about the victory.

“We’ll take positives from the game, as will Belcoo,” said Greene. “For me, the best thing about the game was the character shown by those lads who have come into the team and we are just happy to have come out on the right side of a one one point win.”

The league continues this week and the table toppers will be hoping to maintain the gap to the rest when they take on Teemore although Greene knows that they are going to face a very stern challenge from a Shamrocks side that will have been boosted by last week’s win over Ederney.

“You know what you are going to get against Teemore, it is going to be a tough physical battle as it always is,” he added.

Teemore’s win left Belcoo on their own at the bottom of the table with two points now separating them and the Shamrocks with Lisnaskea a further point ahead.

With Belcoo playing the Emmets this Friday night it is a chance for them to close that gap and Clarke knows it is an important game.

“Despite the good performance last week against Derrygonnelly we didn’t get anything out of it and we’re adrift at the bottom so Friday night’s game is an important one for Belcoo,” he stated.

Belcoo set out with a defensive gameplan away to Derrygonnelly and it worked well as they made life difficult for the home side.

Derrygonnelly enjoyed plenty of early possession but they struggled to breakdown the visitors and it was Belcoo who opened the scoring as they turned over possession with James McGrath feeding Johnny Feeley who slotted over.

Feeley also registered his side’s second point from a free but with Paul Ward and Garvan McGinley also converting frees it left the scores at 0-02 apiece at the end of the first quarter.

The home side edged ahead when Stephen McGullion fired over a point from play but it was Belcoo who were to go on and swoop for the key score of the half as they notched the only goal of the game.

Niall McGovern found Paul McGrath who played the ball across the goalmouth for Feeley to crash to the net to make it 1-02 to 0-03.

And Belcoo were to add to their advantage when Philip Leonard fired over from the left to put them three ahead.

However, Derrygonnelly finished the half well and with Ward and McGinley again slotting over frees the home side went in just the one adrift.

Indeed, it was level early in the second half as Ward clipped over his third free of the game and the Harps got their noses in front when Lee Jones fired over from play to make it 0-07 to 1-03.

At this point Derrygonnelly were on top and they could have been further ahead only for a good block by Leonard on McGullion as he shot at the Belcoo goal.

However, the away side settled back to the task after this and Aaron Dolan landed two points, one from a 45 and one from play.

Harps substitute Barry McGrath tied things up once more although the Harps were indebted to goalkeeper Jack Kelly who pulled off two fantastic saves in the second half to deny Ian Corrigan and Dolan.

It was tit for tat over the closing period with Dolan and McGrath firing over Belcoo and Ward and Neil Gallagher pointing for the Harps as it remained level.

However, the home side had the final say as Ward lofted over the winner in the final minute to secure two hard earned points for Derrygonnelly.