Match Result
- Result: Galwegians Firsts 41 - Enniscorthy 24
- Venue: Crowley Park on Sat Nov 29th 2025
- Competition: AIL Division 2B
Match Report
Galwegians continued their perfect start to the season with a seventh straight bonus point win when they overcame visitors Enniscorthy at Crowley Park on Saturday.
This was almost a top versus bottom clash with the Wexford men joint bottom of the table. However, any notions of a comfortable home win for the league leaders were soon dispelled as the Blues faced one of their toughest matches to date, and for long periods the visitors were right in the contest. The first half was a seesaw affair where the lead changed hands no less than five times.
The visitors opened the scoring with a penalty in the 15th minute from out half Conor Kervick. The response from The Blues was immediate as right from the restart they went on the attack, and good work by Darragh Kennedy led to some phases near the line. The ball was eventually spun wide to centre Rob Deacy who barged over on the left for his side's opening try.
However, 'Scorthy had a strong pack who were causing difficulty, and it was no surprise when they regained the lead when a second successive 5m line out maul was taken down, and referee Brian Bennett awarded a penalty try. Yet again the Blues responded to the setback within minutes. In a very similar move to their first try, this time it was outside centre Finn Treacy who took a sweet line through a gap in the middle and scored under the posts, giving Tiarnan Neville a simple conversion.
The pattern was repeated before half-time as more good work by the visiting pack led to hooker Davey Murphy finishing another line out maul, which was superly converted by Ben Kidd to restore a five point lead. Then right on half time, Treacy showed his talent when he pinned his ears and outsprinted the cover down the right to score an excellent try, with a perfect conversion by Neville nudging the hosts 19-17 ahead at the break.
The hosts came right out of the blocks upon the restart with a slight wind advantage, and on 42 minutes winger Oisin McKey turned defence into attack with a brilliant piece of skill and he found support which gave Jack Winters a sight of the line, and the front-row powered over to score on the left and put the hosts 7 points clear with an unconverted try.
Enniscorthy were undaunted and the tit for tat continued as five minutes later their hooker Murphy scored his brace when he finished off another maul. Kidd split the posts to make the match level with more than half an hour remaining. It seemed in the balance at this point, however the Blues took control and they nudged back in front when substitute Conor O'Shaughnessy, who had just replaced Treacy, landed a 54th minute penalty.
Wegians began to take control at this point as the tiring visitors were by now coughing up more opportunities, and the Blues' extra firepower in the backline was beginning to tell. Just on the hour mark a good passage of play was finished strongly again by Deacy to the right of the posts, giving O'Shaughnessy a simple conversion for a 10-point lead.
They kept up the pressure and five minutes later it was the unstoppable Deacy who again finished off a well worked backline move and powered over from the left to score his first ever AIL hat-trick and put him top of the scoring charts across all AIL divisions. O'Shaughnessy's conversion put the Blues 17 points clear and out of reach.
Enniscorthy to their credit never gave up and they were unlucky not to salvage a lake bonus point, but their intense pressure on the line was excellently withstood by a determined Wegians defence. And so the juggernaut rolls on and the Blues face a trip to Navin this weekend where they will seek to make it eight wins from eight. They are now the only team in the AIL who are on maximum points from the first seven game rounds.
