NFC Kesh 6

PSNI Olympic 1

Kesh eased through to the next round of the Irish Junior Cup with a comfortable 6-1 win over PSNI Olympic. The Fermanagh side raced into a three goal lead inside the first ten minutes, and the result was never in doubt with Grant Ellis, Mark Jones, Chris McDowell, Kyle Malone and Darren McQuade all getting on the score sheet.

“That performance has been coming,” said Kesh manager Scott Robinson. “It was a comfortable win but it was a good performance and that is the main thing. We have been creating chances and not taking them, but on Saturday we took about a third of them. It could have been eighteen! They had a few good players and they played some good stuff but our back four stood tall and Ryan Beatty was an old head on young shoulders and commanded the midfield very well. We were keeping the ball and putting together some great passages of play. It was a poor goal to concede and it was maybe a wee bit lax at 4-0 up and it shouldn’t be that way, but we came out in the second half and picked it up again and created chance after chance.”

Robinson came in as manager at the start of the season, and although they are still waiting for their first league win of the season, the new manager believes he is starting to see signs of improvement. “It was a positive result and the boys are smiling and buying in to what we want them to do,” he said. “They are starting to listen and play the way we want them to play. We are into the hat for the next round and that is the main thing. We have three trophies that we can win, and the Junior is one of them, and you have to make sure you stay in it. Hopefully we will get better and better and we will see where then draw takes us.”

Kesh were missing nine squad players for the match, but despite the change in the personnel they made a lightening start to the match. They thought they had taken the lead with just three minutes on the clock when Chris McDowell headed in Josh Flack’s cross, only for the referee to rule it out for offside. It was only a temporary reprieve for the PSNI team as Kesh’s next effort on target put them ahead. McDowell’s corner was flicked on by Mark Jones, and Grant Ellis blasted the ball into the net at the back post. Three minutes later it was 2-0 when Jones netted from a Lee Walker cross, and on ten minutes the game was virtually over as a contest when they added a third through McDowell. Jones then collected a Walker pass and beat two defenders before finding the bottom corner to make it 4-0, and although they conceded just before half time, they were back on top at the start of the second half. Jordan Flack had come off the bench to set up Kyle Malone for number five, and Darren McQuade completed the win with a well struck free kick five minutes from the end.