Cunningham goal inflicts first loss of the season on Rangers

Tummery Athletic inflicted a first league defeat of the season on Enniskillen Rangers as they secured the win in a hard fought game at The Ball Range where chances were at a premium. 
The winning goal came 15 from the end when the dangerous Niall Donnelly unselfishly pulled the ball back to Ryan Cunningham and he made no mistake with a clinical finish past Jerome Carlton.
Carlton had made a brilliant save from Donnelly in the first half to keep Tummery at bay while at the other end Mark Cutler went closest for Rangers when his acrobatic scissors kick glanced off the angle of bar and post.
Tummery boss Shaun McDermott was pleased with the way his side played and in particular with how they were able to keep Rangers’ chances to a premium;
“It was good to get the win and we could have maybe wrapped up the game with another goal in the last few minutes but overall I’m very pleased and defensively I thought we were very solid.”
Two players called up from the reserves Peader Teague at right back and Eoghan Curran at centre half were eye catching with Blaine Campbell a very solid partner for Curran. Rangers put plenty of pressure on, particularly in the second half with balls into the box but the Tummery defence stood firm.
At the other end the trickery and pace of Donnelly caused problems and he was at the heart of everything that Tummery did well in attack over the course of the 90 minutes with Mark Corry influential in the middle of the field.
For Rangers player manager Michael Kerr there was no major despondency at the final whistle;
“It was our first loss of the season so I can’t be too hard on the boys and there was plenty of effort on Saturday too, we just found it difficult to create chances,” said the ‘Gers boss whose side trail leaders Strathroy Harps by four points.
Rangers have just one game to go before Christmas and Kerr is targeting a win to round off a very successful calender year;
“We are still in the Junior Cup after Christmas and that was a goal and we are in the top to in the league so we can’t complain. We want to finish off the year well though and then get ourselves ready for after Christmas.”
As for Tummery, their boss McDermott is looking for his side to string together a few more wins before Christmas.
“We have a big game this week against Irvinestown and we have to find some consistency. There have been times when we have had everyone available but we haven’t played well at all. At the weekend we played well but we have to start putting together two or three good performances.”