Clontarf secured 1st place and a home AIL Semi-final with a hard earned victory over close rivals Old Belvedere in Anglesea Rd on Friday night.
Clontarf started brightly but were undone on a number of occasions by a determined home defence which forced errors and turnovers. Despite dominating possession Clontarf found themselves behind by 10 points after 15 minutes to a penalty and a try scored by home centre Aidan Wynne after the referee deemed a mishandle in the centre to have gone backwards. A decision which defied the laws of physics as the player had stormed onto the ball from deep. Encouragingly, Clontarf never lost composure and after good work on the right saw Mick McGrath in, a classic training ground wrap around a lineout befuddled the home defence and Matt Darcy cut a line for the second in 3 minutes. That left the half time score 16 13.
The second half action was dominated early by the Clontarf youngsters Carbury and O’Brien who fed off great work by the forwards in the Belvo 22 for a score to the latter converted by the former and shortly afterwards the pack took a ball against the head and again Conor O’Brien had space and pace enough to stand up the defence and score his second. Carbury again added the points and despite a late score from Belvo winger Killeen after the Tarf 10 was yellow carded, Clontarf hung on for a well-deserved victory.
And so Clontarf have topped the league section of the competition and will face UCD in the semi-final of the UBL. A quick look at the statistics shows that in 8 of the last 10 seasons Clontarf have finished in the top 4 or achieved a semi-final playoff. That is outstanding consistency in such a competitive league and is a credit to all involved.