AIL Dolphin 26 Old Crescent 21
Dolphin finally got their season up and running with a deserved win over Old Crescent on Saturday , however the last 10 minutes were heart stopping.
Old Crescent prop Cathal O’Reilly showed many talents, a dummy, a kick ahead for Val McDermot to finish to put the visitors 7-0 ahead. Another dummy, this time from Cam O’Shaughnessy led him to score close to the posts and Daryl Foley levelled the score and he added a penalty before half time.
Another Daryl Foley penalty extended the lead to 13-7 before Alan O’Sullivan followed up when an Old Crescent player failed to deal with a kick and he kicked it over the line and won the race to score a try. Cam O’ Shaughnessy scored his 2nd try in the corner to give Dolphin a 23-7 lead.
Old Crescent were not giving up and a converted try kept them in the game, Dolphin then extended the lead to 26-14.
The last 10 minutes contained virtually everything, one thing more than anything else and that was DRAMA.
Old Crescent had a lineout 5 metres out, a Dolphin player got his hand to it but it went forward. From the scrum, the referee did not apply the same logic as Ben Whitehouse in the Aviva last week, and when Dolphin were penalised in the scrum, a penalty try and a yellow card for David Jennings followed.
26-21, Old Crescent were all fired up, inside the Dolphin 22, Dolphin were awarded a scrum but a Dolphin player kicked the ball after the whiste and he went to the Bin.
The referee then ran over to the Dolphin bench, the nominated reserve prop Luke Jordan had replaced Liam Walsh because of a leg injury mid way through the first half. The Law is that if you are not in a position to replace an injured/ sin binned prop you must lose another player if the scrums go uncontested. Winger Timmy Phelan was withdrawn and 12 man Dolphin got possession from the scrum but there must have been seconds left because John Fitzgerald was forced to take the ball into contact, but once it was recycled it was kicked off the pitch and Dolphin had held out for an important victory.
Link to Declan Forrest’s photo’s