Maguiresbridge 0-13 St. Patrick’s, Donagh 1-09
Maguiresbridge and St. Pat’s faced off in this year’s Intermediate Championship basement fixture and after a tight ending that saw Donagh level late on, Adrian Diver’s side eventually got over the line with a one-point win as Luca McCusker hit the game-winner at Emmet Park.
After sending Newtownbutler down in the same fixture last year, St. Pat’s will now play Junior Championship football themselves after a closely contested affair in Lisnaskea.
The St. Mary’s side had a bright opening 30 minutes on Sunday and they got scores on the board early through a Mark Hughes free kick in the opening minute.
Ryan Hyde made yards before twisting and hooking over a second point off the right boot.
Eamon Maguire drilled a free high and over the bar at the other end, but Caolan Duffy swiftly responded.
With the wind in their favour, Maguiresbridge hit two more points with Danny Teague and Luca McCusker on target but Donagh then hit back with a goal.
After threatening a couple of times on the break with pace, Maguire was played in behind goal and he closed in on goal from an angle and fired in low to the net to make it 0-05 to 1-01.
Another Bridge point was added to by Hughes who found space to land a score from play.
Sean Corrigan hit the final point of the half with a monster free from outside the '45 to make it 0-08 to 1-01 as the sides headed towards the changing rooms.
Corrigan would then open the second half scoring with another point before a long bouncing ball in towards Brian McDermott was flicked on by the forward and it allowed Jimmy Tormey to go racing in one-on-one but his shot flew over the bar.
Maguire sent over another free to make it 0-09 to 1-03.
Hughes had a chance to cancel that out with a free from the left wing at the other end and his effort dropped short but McCusker reacted quickest to punch over the bar.
Eoghan Curran found room to point and McDermott did the same a minute later for Donagh.
McDermott went close to another St. Pat’s goal but after cutting in from an angle his shot was saved by goalkeeper Feidhlim O’Connor.
Teague pointed in between scores from Maguire and Tormey to make it a two-point game with 10 minutes to go as the Bridge then also missed a goal opportunity as a well-worked break saw Teague fist across goal for Corrigan to palm onto the outside of the left post from an angle.
After closing the gap again, Donagh caught momentum winning four Bridge kick-outs in a row in the final few moments and they levelled the game in added time when the returning Johnny O’Reilly was fouled by Rory Porteous.
Dara Foster sent over the free from close range to make it 0-12 to 1-09.
The Bridge finally managed to win the resultant kick-out and Duffy made ground with his pace before the ball was played to McCusker who turned to fire over the bar and win the game.
Maguiresbridge boss, Adrian Diver, was pleased to see his side retain Intermediate football next year: “I suppose relief was the main emotion after the game yesterday. I thought it was an excellent game with two teams fighting for their lives. I thought we did relatively well with our first-half performance although we had a lot of poor wides, and their goal was a bit of a sucker punch.
"The lads showed great character to score the winning score after conceding an equaliser so late in the game and I feel overall, we did just about enough to win the game.”
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