Tyrone footballers through to Ulster U21 Final for third time in this decade

A strong first half display laid the foundations for victory as Tyrone qualified for their third Ulster U21Final this decade with a four point victory over Armagh at Breffni Park.

One look at the final score on Wednesday night would suggest that this was a close encounter but that wasn’t the case after well executed goals from Lee Brennan and Conor Meyler helped propel the Red Hands to a 2-6 to 1-1 interval advantage.

The Orchard County may have had the better of things on the scoreboard in the second period but they never looked like mounting a comeback with their second goal coming in injury time at the end of the game.

Tyrone’s reward is a final showdown with Donegal and after results at minor and senior level between the counties let’s hope the outcome is different this time around.

The winners looked composed and confident on the ball right from the start and they eased into a 0-3 to 0-0 lead thanks to points from Ruairi McGlone, Kieran McGeary and Danny McNulty, the Clonoe man’s effort an outstanding effort over his shoulder from out on the left wing.

Armagh hadn’t threatened in those early stages but in the 14th minute they drew level with a goal against the run of play, Aidan Nugent rifling the ball past Sean Fox after a collecting a long delivery in from Jamie Cosgrove.

Instead of a setback for Tyrone it proved to be the opposite as they seized control of the remainder of the half limiting their opponents to a single point in the process.

Lee Brennan put Tyrone in front from a 16th minute free and sixty seconds later the same player first timed the ball in style to the bottom right hand corner of the Armagh net.

Four minutes later and the winners were in complete charge when Conor Meyler stormed through the Armagh defence before skilfully chipping keeper Blaine Hughes for an outstanding goal.

McNulty and McGeary added points with a free from Ethan Rafferty sandwiched in between to bring the first half scoring to a close.

Midfielder Cathal McShane landed a wonderful point from out on the right wing on the restart and after Ciaran O’Hanlon and Rafferty had replied the Owen Roes man came up with an even better score for a 2-8 to 1-3 lead.

The rest of the third quarter, though, then belonged to Armagh with Rafferty converting a couple of frees after Ryan McShane had taken a neat point from play with the outside of his boot.

Brennan and Rafferty exchanged points from frees before Tyrone keeper Sean Fox was called into action to produce a top class save to deny McShane.

A goal at that stage would have reduced the deficit to three points but Tyrone didn’t panic with Brennan and Mark Kavanagh both supplying scores.

Tyrone lost McGeary late on to a second booking while Armagh got a consolation goal from substitute Jack Grugan but it was only academic at that stage.