Tummery Athletic 6 Damolly 0

A strong second half performance took Tummery Athletic through to the next round of the Junior Cup at Crawford’s Lane on Saturday against Damolly.

Ryan Hanna’s side had taken a one-goal lead in at half-time, having played against a strong breeze, and they went on to dictate proceedings in the second half, bagging a further five goals to put their name in the hat for the next round of junior football’s blue riband competition.

“The first half probably blew the Christmas cobwebs away but in the second half we played very well.

“To score six goals, create chances for more and also to keep a clean-sheet, I can’t really have asked for any more than that. I was very pleased with the second-half performance,” said Hanna.

Against a strong breeze, Tummery started the game well and controlled the tie for the opening 15 minutes or so without really creating much in the way of chances.

The Dromore side though did go on to open the scoring as Aidy McCaffrey played the ball over the top to Martin Hughes and he took it on the bounce and sidefooted it to the roof of the net to make it 1-0.

However, Tummery were poor over the remainder of the half as they lost the control they had, and Damolly created a couple of half chances although they failed to convert as it remained 1-0 at the break.

Hanna made a few tweaks to the team set up at the interval and Tummery went on to produce some fine football over the rest of the tie as they pinned the visitors back deep in their own half.

And it was not long before they doubled their advantage as McCaffrey controlled the ball on the edge of the box before curling a lovely effort to the corner of the net.

It was all the home side after this and Blain Campbell made it 3-0 with a close-range header from a Declan McNulty cross before Brian Og Campbell then teed up Paudie Dillon, who clipped the ball home to make it 4-0.

Tummery continued to carve out scoring chances and McCaffrey bagged his second of the game with another fine finish from the edge of the box, while Dillon and McNulty combined to set up number six as McNulty pulled the ball back for Hughes to tap in as Tummery eased through.

It is back to the bread and butter of the league for the next few weeks with the next three fixtures having been released, and with that followed by the Mulhern Cup and then the Junior Cup, that helps with planning ahead for the next five weeks.

“We now know what we face over the next five weeks with three league games and then the Mulhern Cup and the Junior, and that is good for planning ahead,” said Hanna.

And first up is a league meeting with an in-form Kesh this Saturday in a big league encounter.

“This is a game that has been postponed twice and it is going to be a tough game because they have been in really good form since Rocket [Ryan Campbell] took charge of them,” added Hanna.