Irvinestown Wanderers 2 Enniskillen Rangers 3

Enniskillen Rangers will play Enniskillen Town in the semi final of the Mulhern Cup, after they dispatched Irvinestown Wanderers at the second time of asking.

Rangers had led the first game 2-0 before the match was abandoned after a bad injury to Wanderers’ player Sean Clear, but they got the job done in the replayed game thanks to a goal from Neil Coulter and two from Jason Keenan.

Irvinestown had taken an early lead through Joey Millar before Rangers overhauled them before half time. Wanderers drew level with a spectacular long range effort from Dwayne Carleton, but Rangers earned their place in the last four when Keenan grabbed the winner 13 minutes from time.

“It was a real cup battle from start to finish, and I was just glad to come out of it and get to the semi final. Irvinestown played well and worked hard but overall I felt that we were the deserving winners,” said Rangers’ boss Michael Kerr, who now has a local derby to look forward to in the semi final.

“That will be a brilliant game to be part of. They are going well in the league but although we have beaten them in the league, the previous games will mean nothing. It’s about who is up for it on the day.

“We will have a game plan we will look to take into the match, but I’m expecting a nip and tuck game, I don’t expect anyone to be running away with it.”

Irvinestown manager Darren Higginbotham admitted his team struggled to come to terms with the fallout from Clear’s injury in the first match, but was pleased by how the club and players responded to the situation.

“I’m extremely proud of how the club dealt with everything, I’m extremely proud of how Sean dealt with everything, and on Saturday I was proud of how the players dealt with everything,” he said.

Proud of players

“Seeing what happened the week previous doesn’t leave the mind straight away, and to go out on Saturday and play as well as they did, I was very proud of how they approached the game and performed. We were much improved from the week previous.

“We didn’t have much time to work on anything, but we knew we had to make a few tweaks from that first game to leave ourselves competitive.

“We lost Sean and others, and guys got opportunities in the changes we made, and everyone to a man stood up and did extremely well. While we were obviously disappointed to lose and go out of the Mulhern, as a manager all you can ask for is your players give you everything, and every single player did that.

“Unfortunately the result wasn’t meant to be, but in terms of performance I had no complaints whatsoever.”

Wanderers’ made the perfect start to the match when they took the lead after three minutes, Millar racing clear of the defence and slotting past Luke Johnston in the Rangers’ goal.

There was little to chose between the teams for much of the opening exchanges, but Rangers got back on level terms after half an hour when a deep free kick to the far post was headed back across goal by Richard Johnston, and Coulter made no mistake from inside the six yard box.

With two minutes remaining of the first half, Rangers’ took the lead for the first time. A flowing move saw Joel Byrne cut in from the left and find Ciaran Brough. His cutback found Jason Keenan, and he rounded Jerome Carleton before firing into the net.

Ten minutes into the second half the game was level again when Dwayne Carleton’s superbly struck lob from 40 yards flew over Johnston, and Wanderers came close to retaking the lead when a corner was cleared as far as Christopher McMulkin on the edge of the penalty area, but his effort was touched over the bar by Johnston.

Two minutes later Rangers snatched the winning goal, with a move from back to front. Johnston found Coulter who passed it wide to Conor Rippey. He advanced down the line before laying the ball in to Jason Keenan. The striker released Brough and spun off towards the penalty area, collecting Brough’s cross on the edge of the area and drilling a low shot into the bottom corner to seal the win.