Inishowen 1st XV 62---7 Clogher Valley 3rd XV
November 3rd 2007

Saturday saw, in coach Kevin Gallagher’s opinion, Inishowens best performance to date, controlling large swathes of the play, dominating in all sections of the game and clinically taking scoring chances throughout the 80 minutes, indeed, it was a benchmark performance that many of the league games to come could be measured against.

Clogher had made the trip up from County Tyrone very confident in giving the Peninsula men a shock, sitting third in the league, recording three very good wins from their last three encounters; they had travelled up with the clear intention in taking an Inishowen scalp.

But from the kick off, and within three or four phases of play, Inishowen had opened the scoring taking a converted try, and laying down the marker for the rest of the game. They showed good maturity and confidence especially in defence, where they poured pressure on the visitors attack, making it impossible for them to string cohesive phases together.

It was this confidence in their defensive capabilities that was the biggest factor in their development, in previous encounters, they would have been tempted to compete illegally for the ball on the ground in the ruck area, but Saturdays game saw them focus instead on swamping the attack off the base of the oppositions rucks to limit and spoil their options.

This served the home team well by denying Clogher any structure but also frequently turning the ball over to win back possession, this was then used constructively for attacks out wide by the mercurial Oliver McConologue who cut Cloghers defence open on numerous occasions.

The only downside to Inishowens performance was having hooker Mojo Harkin sent off during an incident just before half time. When this whistle did come, it saw the game as a competition virtually over with Inishowen leading 38 points to 7.

In previous encounters this season where Inishowen have clocked up big scores in the first half, their second half performance has faltered to some degree, but this was hardly the case on Saturday when from the restart, the home team although down to 14 men, continued in the same vein as the first half, keeping the tries coming on a frequent basis.

Finn McCormick, deputising for the absent Paul McMenamin at fly half produced a kicking tour de force, setting up both McConologue and Conor Mulkearns for tries with intelligent kicking into space for the boys to collect and score with, and producing artillery shell clearance kicks from his 22metre line.

Inishowen kept their shape and their systems and pushed the visitors all the way to the final whistle, and this discipline will keep them in good stead for their next league encounter, away against Lurgan next Saturday.