Match report by Geoff Ingham

Donaghadee welcomed CIYMS to Donaldson Park on Saturday for a pre-season friendly to help both teams prepare for their respective upcoming league fixtures which begin next week. The opposition play in the league above the Dee so the coaching team of Paul Blewitt, John West and Ray Dobson knew they would provide a stern test. They also took the opportunity to give several young players the experience of playing at this level, hence the reason for a 27-man squad. The pitch was in excellent condition, albeit still moist from the early morning downpour. CI kicked off and for the first 10 minutes the Dee had plenty of possession but spent most of the time inside their own half. When CI had the ball the Dee’s defence stood up well and was able to snuff out any danger posed by a strong looking CI backline. A Dee forward was sent to the bin for tackling the man in the air but CI were not able to take advantage of the extra man. Dee had a couple of good chances at this stage, Robbie Ingham making good ground down the right wing and a charge down from Callum Montgomery forcing the CI defence to touch down over their own line. However, it was CI who eventually broke the deadlock after 21 minutes when they scored a converted try after several phases of play inside the Dee 22. Ten minutes later CI doubled their lead when their centre won the race for the touchdown from a kick ahead. Just before half time the Dee’s Luke Norman had to leave the field due to nasty finger injury, bringing to an end an impressive debut for the young man.

The Dee coaches had used the break to make several changes to the Dee’s line up and it was encouraging to see several players from the Dee’s Academy making their debuts for the senior side. CI, however, were gaining the upper hand at this stage and scored their third try after only 4 minutes of the second half when they took advantage of a two man overlap, the winger touching down in the corner to give them a 19-0 lead. Six minutes later they scored again when the centre broke through the Dee’s defence and sent the right winger over in the corner to push the lead to 24-0. With half an hour to go the Dee supporters were fearing the worst but thankfully the team had other ideas. With the forwards becoming more dominant in the scrums and the lineout functioning well the Dee enjoyed both the majority of possession and territory for the remainder of the game and their efforts were rewarded with several scores. The first one came from a scrum penalty which was kicked to the corner. An excellent driving maul from the line out took play to 5 yards from the line and Ray Dobson broke away and bulldozed his way over the line. The second one was a touch of class from Ben Beattie who fielded a clearance kick at the 10- yard line, sidestepped his opposite number and beat the last 2 defenders to score in the corner. The last try, 5 minutes from time, was the result of more excellent work by the forwards, with Robbie Grant touching down after several good phases of play leaving the final score 24-17 in favour of CI.

This was a satisfactory warm up exercise for the Dee who start their league campaign on Saturday 27th August when they welcome Larne to Donaldson Park, Kick off 2.30pm.