Anelka-like: St Josephs' Stephen Westwood celebrates after scoring the third.
St Joseph’s 3; Grannagh 0
■□■ View More Photos
Grannagh’s fading, flickering hopes of catching the leaders Dungarvan United were extinguished completely on Saturday afternoon when they lost heavily to an impressive St Joseph’s side.
The mid-table outfit dominated the majority of the game and they fully deserved the three points. Grannagh are the cup specialists of Division One (three final appearances and two triumphs in three seasons) and they will now focus on that competition once again.
However, on the evidence of this display, St Joseph’s – Waterford’s oldest club – will have a big say in the cup also this season. A number of the home players shone in this contest, none more so than Richie Burke who caused havoc down the right side of the pitch with his attacking forays into the Grannagh box from midfield.
Overall this was a terrific display by the Saints and Grannagh could have no complaints.
Early goal
St Joseph’s got off to a dream start by scoring after only two minutes. Jim Manning and Stephen Westwood did the spade work for Mark Masterson and the strong striker lobbed the ball over goalkeeper Sean Phelan from just outside the penalty area.
To their credit the South Kilkenny club fought back and Johnny Purcell brought a good save from Josephs goalkeeper Ruari Sheridan.
On 20 minutes John Paul Kelly was unlucky to see a rasping drive from 25 yards go inches wide of Sheridan’s left upright. Disaster struck for Grannagh when St Joseph’s increased their lead on 26 minutes. David Flynn sent in a free kick from the right which should have been held by Sean Phelan, but unfortunately from a Grannagh point of view the ’keeper dropped the ball and Ian O’Regan, the Mount Sion hurling goalkeeper, took full advantage to hammer the ball to the roof of the net from four yards.
The visitors never recovered from that setback. In the last minute of the first half a sweeping Saints move saw David Flynn playing a delightful ball through the Grannagh defence but Stephen Westwood shot wide with Sean Phelan advancing.
See The Munster Express newspaper for full story.
