Another missed opportunity

Despite the loss at Midleton, Bangor still managed to pick up a losing bonus point away from home, which was a small consolation. However, in such a tight league it’s vital that as many points as possible are secured when playing at home. This would have been foremost in the players’ minds as they ran out at Upritchard Park to face Clonmel – a side they had mixed success against last season.

The visitors elected to play into the wind in the opening half. From the kick-off, Bangor played to this advantage and were immediately on the attack. Within 4 minutes, a superb break by Craig Gilroy looked to have created the perfect scoring opportunity for Danny Young outside him on the right wing, but the ball was fumbled and the chance was gone. Undeterred, Bangor kept up the pressure and soon had another opening – this time on the left wing – but the final pass was rushed and went into touch instead of Connor Scollan’s hands.

Having survived a couple of strong try-scoring chances, Clonmel started to get into gear and were soon moving from defence into attack. Although far from dominant in the scrums, Clonmel contrived to cause enough disruption on Bangor’s put-in and were rewarded with penalties as a result. From one of these, a long kick to touch was followed up with a lineout and drive that produced the first try of the game, which was also converted to give the visitors a 0-7 lead by the end of the first quarter.

For most of the remainder of the first half, play was contained within Bangor’s half and it is perhaps to Bangor’s credit that they managed to deny Clonmel any further scores, despite being under constant pressure. However, playing into the wind in the second half wouldn’t make things easier for Bangor if they wanted to get back on terms.

As it turned out, Bangor were to be quickly rewarded for their efforts when Gareth Millar converted a penalty to narrow the gap to 3-7 after just a couple of minutes of the second half. Unfortunately this was soon cancelled out after a poor Bangor lineout resulted in a Clonmel penalty which they successfully kicked.

Things didn’t improve a few minutes later when Clonmel burst straight through a ruck before touching down for a try under Bangor’s posts. They then added another penalty after Bangor were judged to have illegally wheeled a scrum, which stretched their lead to 3-20 with a quarter of the match left to play.

Something then seemed to click with the Bangor players as their attack and overall work rate found another gear. A determined move started in the backs was finished off with a powerful drive for the line by Matt Bougoure, with Rhys Larmour adding the conversion. Just 3 minutes later, Bangor created another good attack, started by Gilroy down the left hand side, which was then kicked across to Danny Young on the opposite wing who took play to within a few metres of the Clonmel goal line. The forwards joined in the attack, bringing play in-field before Bougoure took over and forced his way over for another try, again converted by Larmour. Now with less than 10 minutes left to play, Bangor were right back in contention at 17-20.

Clonmel wisely used the wind advantage to put in some long kicks to touch, both to keep play out of their own half, and also in the knowledge that Bangor’s lineout was continuing to have problems. As Bangor fought to break out of their own twenty two and back into attack, they suffered another penalty, this time in front of their posts, which was easily converted to move Clonmel further ahead by 17-23. Sensible game management by Clonmel effectively closed out the remaining few minutes of play, securing their victory and inflicting another defeat on Bangor.

Another losing bonus point, while always valuable, is a poor return on what could have been much more for Bangor. As they travel to Bruff next weekend, the contrast in fortunes couldn’t be greater as the big Munster men are unbeaten so far and will be hard to crack at their home ground. However, Bangor cannot afford to let many more league points slip through their fingers if they are to avoid being rooted to the lower end of the league table.