Cabinteely reached the second round of this season’s U-19 Enda McGill Cup after a 1-0 win over Longford Town. Ronan O’Kelly scored the winning goal for Cabo.
Cabinteely were on a high coming into this game after a 1-1 draw with a very strong UCD side, while Longford lost 3-1 to Bohemians last week, even though their coach thought it was one of their best performances this season.
Cabinteely’s John Paul Kelly said of the win, “Nice to be in the next round of the cup . Longford made it hard for us and played some really nice football.”
“Some really good work by Ryan Byrne put Ronan O’Kelly in and he scored a lovely goal. It was a very composed finish to put us in the lead inside the first five minutes.”
“Ronan has done well for us and is a really clever player, who always gives 100% and he’s always wanting to learn and push on.”
He went on to say, “I thought we had some really good passages of play in the match and didn’t take our chances when they came.”
There were some good performances for us today especially in the second half. I thought Jamie Broderick and Adam Maher at the back were very good, and led by example, as we’ve had to make a few changes over the last few weeks with injuries.”
As for Longford Town manager Graham Kane, he said, “I am naturally disapointed about the result, but very satisfied with our overall performance.”
“We started the first ten minutes very slowly, and you won’t get away with that at this level, and it cost us the game.”
However, overall I’m really happy with the performance the boys put in. Today’s game was an opportunity for players who haven’t played much of late to stake a claim in the team and I felt they did just that.”
“I thought we dominated the majority of the game but we just couldnt find that break through. We need to be better in the final third and create more chances.”
“Aaron McTiernan did really well today playing up top, he worked really hard and linked our play very well at times. Our midfielders Hayden Rogers and Oisin Proudfoot I thought did really well and doninated that area of the pitch.”
“Sean Bragazzi has been our standout player so far this season playing at centre-back. We moved him into the middle for this game and he really effected it.”
“Overall I’m happy with the game, but we need to build on this now going into a tough game against Sligo Rovers in two weeks time. But we’ll prepare right for that game and we will watch Sligo play Bohs next week and prepare correctly for them.”