Match report by Geoff Ingham

Donaghadee travelled to Chambers Park on Saturday to take on current league leaders Portadown in a Kukri Championship 2 League game. As has been the trend all season there were several changes to the previous week’s line up, mostly in the forwards. Sam Ingham and Paddy Aherne have joined the lengthy injury list, Chris Hamilton was unavailable and Noah Greenald was serving his one match suspension. Paul Hamilton made a welcome return from injury at hooker and Ali Barnes returned at prop. Andy McCracken came into the second row and Curtis Ewing made his 1st XV debut in the back row. The only change in the backline saw Robbie Ingham starting on the wing, with Ryan Butler and Davy Skipp occupying the bench. The weather throughout the whole game was nothing short of horrendous with a bitterly cold, gale force wind driving the rain across the exposed pitch. It was going to be difficult for both teams to play decent rugby in the moist conditions. The Dee kicked off with the wind in their favour and for the first 15 minutes enjoyed most of the possession. Portadown, however, soon had their first try when Dee had a kick charged down. The loose ball was gathered by Portadown who then moved the ball across the backline allowing the full back to score an unconverted try in the corner. Portadown doubled their lead ten minutes later when their fullback ran a great line to break through the Dee’s defensive line. The Dee enjoyed several phases of play in the next ten minutes with Jack Chesney, Robbie Grant and Ali Barnes to the fore. With five minutes of the half left Dee made a mess of their own scrum which allowed the opposition No8 to stroll untouched over the try line. On the stroke of half time Portadown secured their try bonus point when a rolling maul took play deep into the Dee’s 22 and after a couple more phases one of their forwards crashed over to score. This time the conversion was successful to leave the half time score 22-0 to the home team.

As the second half kicked off, with the elements now in Portadown’s favour, the small cohort of wet and cold Dee supporters were fearing the worst. However, the Dee started the second half as the better team and a quickly taken penalty saw Ali Lockhart break down the left wing and almost winning the touchdown after a clever chip ahead. Another quickly taken penalty and good interplay between Lockhart and Ingham took play deep into the 22 and more strong running by Barnes and Grant created further chances for the Dee. With 15 minutes of the half gone Portadown’s outhalf made good use of the wind and executed a fifty twenty-two. A strong rolling maul from the line out took the Portadown pack over the line to register their fifth try. By this stage Davy Skipp had replaced the injured Paul Hamilton and Ryan Butler had also joined the fray. The Dee’s defence was tested on several occasions but a couple of great turnovers relieved the pressure. However, the defensive line was finally broken as the game entered the final quarter when Portadown took advantage of an overlap and scored in the corner. The difficult kick was converted to take the score to 34-0. To the Dee’s credit the final 15 minutes saw them create a plethora of chances with more strong runs from Barnes, Grant and Boyd and the ever-alert Lockhart probing the Portadown defence. However, the home defence stood firm until the referee blew for full time. A hard day at the office for the Dee but certainly the gritty second half display provided plenty of positives and with seven players in the match day squad 20 years old or less it augers well for the future. Man of the match contenders included debutant Curtis Ewing, the hard running Ali Barnes and the experienced Ali Lockhart but the award this week goes to No 8 Robbie Grant who worked hard in attack and defence all day.

Next Saturday Lurgan are the visitors to Donaldson Park, k.o. 2.30pm.