Donoughmore Athletic 5 Rathcoole 1
Newly promoted Donoughmore got their season off to a great start with a 5-1 victory over an under strength Ratcoole in stuake on Saturday. Aidan O'Shea, back after a hamstring injury, scored a brilliant hat-trick with Kenneth Cullinane and Pat Foley also getting off the mark. Donoughmore started strongly and were rewarded with the lead on 10 minutes when O'Shea finished low to the bottom corner after some good build up work. Donoughmore played some good football in the first half and should have been two or three goals to the good after the half-hour when some excellent approach work was finished just off target or was saved by the Rathcoole keeper. Ken Cullinane doubled Donoughmore's advantage just before half-time when his header from a Pat Foley corner fell kindly for himself to finish to the top corner. Donoughmore were under pressure for a ten minute spell at the start of the second half but a defense excellently marshalled by Connie Buckley and Robert O'Sullivan coped well.  Aidan O'Shea made sure of the points in the 58th minute when he hit a wonderful volley low to the bottom corner from an Evan Forde long kick. O'Shea finished off his hat-trick 10 minutes later when he finished high to the net after hesitiaion in the Rathcoole defense. Pat Foley then finished the scoring for Donoughmore in the 80th minute when he robbed a Rathcoole defender on the edge of the penalty area before selling the keeper a dummy and walking the ball into the net. Donoughmore showed a high level of discipline and work-rate throughout and it would be unfair to single out individual players in what was an excellent team performance. Donoughmore have made a good start to their first season in the first division but this is going to be a long season where consistency and level of performance is going to be all important.
Team: E. Forde, C. O'Hanlon, C. Buckley, R. O'Sullivan, P. Murphy, D. McSweeney, D. Hennessy, C. O'Sullivan, P. Foley, K. Cullinane, A. O'Shea. Subs: D. Barrett for A. O'Shea, S. O'Mahoney for K. Cullinane and A. O'Brien for D. McSweeney.