Clondalkin overcame a determined Longford side to book their place in the Quarter Finals of the Leinster Town’s Cup with a 34 vs 23 win in Kingswood on Sunday 19th February. The 11 point winning margin does not tell the tale of the nervous finish from Clondalkin as leading by just 4 points with 2 minutes to go, Longford were held up over the Clon try line only for the home side to break out and score a try through centre Paddy Ryan with the last play of the game.
Longford began the first half in the ascendancy and were putting width on the ball at every opportunity. The Division 2A leaders had to wait just 10 minutes for the cracks to appear in Clons defense and they touched down under the posts for a converted try. , Chris Jebb was on target with a penalty kick to get Clon on the scoreboard on the quarter hour mark. The pressure was all on the home team however and Clon did themselves no favours with a series of poor clearance kicks when they did manage to win back possession. Both sides traded penalties before Longford pushed out to a 7 point margin on the stroke of half-time with their second successful three pointer.
With the wind at their backs, Clon started the second period the stronger and from the kick off, momentum from a Chris Jebb break was continued by Neil Finlay who registered the home teams first try, converted by Jebb. Finlay doubled his tally just 4 minutes later, as he exploited some slack Longford covering, racing in unopposed down the left wing to put Clon ahead on the scoreboard, 18 -13. Longford carried strongly but handling errors by both sides cancelled out any advantage. The visitors reduced the gap to just 2 points with a penalty kick on the 50th minute before Jebb responded with 2 kicks of his own to bring Clon out to a 24 to 16 lead. On the hour mark, a pick and go from a Clon scrum saw the ball turned over in the home sides 22 and quick hands by the Longford men saw them cross the whitewash in the right corner. The sideline conversion put just one point between the teams and that’s how it stayed until the 72nd minute when Clon pressure defense forced a penalty at the breakdown for Jebb to convert and leave the scores at 27 vs 23. A four point game it remained until the final two minutes of drama which saw Clon push out to a winning margin of 11 points and a place in the quarter finals for the third year in a row. The prize is an away match against Skerries.
