Ratoath 4-12 Round Towers 3-12

Friday night saw a Ratoath double at Under 16 - with the Under 15 team winning the Division 4 title and the Under 16's taking the Division 1 title.

The Division 4 game was an absolute cracker with Ratoath coming out on top by one score in an enthralling encounter with a gallant Round Towers. These two had met in the league stages when a massively under strength Round Towers team had no answer to the Ratoath lads. Friday was a different affair altogether and the game was in the balance for the entire 60 minutes.

On a fine evening for football, Round Towers got off to a good start with two lovely points into the town end goal before Tiarnan Ahearne got Ratoath off the mark. In fact Towers looked initially like they were going to dominate the game as their big fielders held the early ground but Ratoath fought hard to get into the game and with Conor Eiffe winning breaking ball they started to get a foothold.

The teams exchanged scores as the game moved from end to end but two goals from Round Towers saw them head into half time a point to the good.

Round Towers 2-6 - Ratoath 1-8

The second half held much of the same quality as the first half with both teams displaying fine skill and moving the ball through the hands with speed. Towers looked to play some ball into their full forward line but Ruairi Coulter gave a man of the match performance at full back and kept the dangerous Towers full forward, Jimmy Corcoran well marshalled. Coulter broke up a number of Towers attacks and was well supported by Cian Kelly in a busy back line.

Jack Flynn and Luke Newe had a tough game at mid field but gave Ratoath a platform going forward and they were well supported by Eiffe and Cian Maher. The difference was goals - Ratoath managed to bag 3 in the second half (Clarke, Eiffe and Ahearne) to one by Towers. Ahearne got the goal that put Ratoath in front and they didn't trail after that.

Towers chased the game manfully but some fine keeping by Sam Coughlan and a generally sound back line performance stopped Towers getting the goal they needed.

Ratoath held on to win 4-12 to 3-12 and the first of the two finals had been won!

Best for Ratoath: Ruairi Coulter was man of the match closely followed by Tiarnan Ahearne - but this was a real team effort with the entire squad playing their part in lifting the trophy!

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