Enniskillen 0-09 Belnaleck 3-03

Three goals in a ten minute spell in the first half proved decisive as Belnaleck secured a three point victory over Enniskillen in Brewster Park on Sunday.

The win followed on from Thursday night’s comfortable victory at home to St Pat’s to keep them firmly in the mix for a league final spot.

The Art McMurroughs currently sit joint second in the Division One table, level on points with Erne Gaels and one point adrift of Derrygonnelly.

Belnaleck manager Nigel Seaney says that it’s too early yet to start thinking about league finals with over half the league games still to be played.

“At this stage it is just about putting points on the board, it’s too early to speak about anything else as we have a number of games against the bigger teams yet to play so we’ll know better after that,” he said.

On the two wins this week, he added: “Again, it was just good to pick up the points. St Pat’s were missing quite a few when we played them and so were Enniskillen. The Enniskillen game was riddled by individual errors by both sides and that is something that we will have to cut out.”

For a depleted Enniskillen it was a weekend that saw them bag one point from the draw against Erne Gaels on Friday night but assistant manager Dar McManus was disappointed not to have taken more from the two games.

“We had a chance to win both games so it was disappointing to draw one and lose the other. It has been a tough period with boys away but hopefully we can start to get some of them back soon.

“We just have to keep trying to improve and hopefully pick up a few wins and push on,” he said.

It was the Gaels who started the game the brighter as they landed the opening three scores of the contest. Michael Dooris knocked over the opener and this was followed by good scores from James O’Donnell and Richie O’Callaghan.

Belnaleck, who lost Lee Cullen to injury inside the first ten minutes, struggled to get going but they were back on level terms at the midway stage of the half as they grabbed their first goal of the half. Kane Connor’s superb ball picked out Ciaran McBrien and he finished to the corner past Ronan Beattie in the Enniskillen goal.

Second goal

The home side replied with an Ethan Beresford free but with 20 minutes on the clock Belnaleck swooped for their second goal. McBrien was fouled as he closed in on goal and from the resultant penalty Garvan Quigley confidently arrowed to the top corner to put the away side two up.

Enniskillen responded well with points from Paddy Reihill and Beresford but they were dealt another hammer blow as Belnaleck got in for goal number three.

Quigley spotted Eamon Greene on the right and he skipped in before drilling a low shot to the back of the net to make it 0-06 to 3-00.

And Belnaleck went on to finish the half on top as Quigley converted a ‘45 and Garrett Cavanagh tagged on a point to leave five between the sides.

Enniskillen then lost Conor Murphy to a black card early in the second half with Quigley firing over the subsequent free to make it six point game.

That though was to be Belnaleck’s sole score of the second half although they did have a couple of good goal chances that they failed to convert, including a McBrien effort that came off the crossbar.

The Gaels also had a big goal opportunity but James O’Donnell’s effort was eventually cleared by the away side.

In a low scoring half, Enniskillen had a Beresford point from play as well as two converted frees by the same player as they closed the gap back to three.

Both sides finished the game with 14 players as O’Callaghan and Connor picked up black cards, and having already been booked Connor was then shown a red, but Enniskillen could not find the goal they needed as Belnaleck came away with the spoils.