*Darragh Leahy leaps into the air for Newmarket Celtic. Photograph: Joe Buckley
OVERCOMING FAIRVIEW RANGERS has seen Newmarket Celtic conquer their biggest scalp of the season.
Gearoid O’Brien’s goal on seventy seven minutes saw Newmarket Celtic dethrone Fairview Rangers as Munster Junior Cup champions and sealed their place in the provincial final for the third time.
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Newmarket boss Paddy Purcell noted that the showdown was their toughest outing of the year. “They are a really good side, they’ve players who have been in League of Ireland for a good number of years and some of them could still be playing there, they are one of the best sides in the country not by a chance, their management structure, coaches they have a really great set-up to be fair to them, they’ve developed their Astro turfs. It is a massive scalp for us, we’re a small team from Clare and they are one of the best teams in the country, we’re delighted with the result”.
Purcell who won an FAI Junior Cup and two Munster Junior Cups while lining out in the heart of the Fairview defence admitted that it was poignant to face off against his former club. “There’s a lot of lads involved in the club who I still know and who I played with but you’ve to put that all aside to be honest with you, I didn’t really think about it too much, I was lucky to have had good success with Fairview before I went off playing League of Ireland, I’ve a special place in my heart for that club and they’ve been one of the best teams in the country for decades but I had to put all of that to one side and focus on what we needed to try do ourselves”.
Corners had been one of the main areas Newmarket Celtic applied attention to on the training ground so it was fitting that a superb David McCarthy was met by a powerful O’Brien header to advance to the Munster Junior Cup final. “They are a very big threat from corners themselves, you could see that from corners and set pieces that they caused us trouble, we were saying it is one of the things we have in our armoury, we didn’t care where the goal came from to be honest, it was as much work on defensive set pieces as attacking pieces, I’m glad Gearoid got the reward”.
With the attacking quartet of Darragh Rainsford, Conor Ellis, Conor Coughlan and Jeffrey Judge asking some questions in the opening half, it proved vital that Newmarket didn’t concede a goal when they retreated to the dressing room.
Purcell reflected, “We were playing into a strong breeze in the first half, they are a really well-drilled side, the lads have been at this level for years, we were under a lot of pressure in the first half but we dealt with it well. They didn’t create any real chances from open play, it was more set pieces, they didn’t carve us open at any stage, I was really proud with how the lads dealt with that pressure. We were glad to see half time in a way because we were under a lot of pressure but nothing too dangerous”.
For Purcell to have guided the club to contest both FAI and Munster Junior Cup finals in his first season as manager is pretty impressive but the former Limerick FC and Waterford Utd centre-half is quick to brush off praise fired in his direction.
He said, “It’s about the players, Stephen Austin our coach, Eoin O’Brien in our management team, Owen McCarthy and Martin Cooney but at the end of the day it’s about the players, the players are doing all we can ask of them, the club are supporting us as much as they can whether we’re looking for recovery sessions or different things, it’s a collective effort, it’s nothing to do with me personally it’s the collective effort of everybody involved. You put in the work and you hope on the day you get the reward, today we got that”.
