IT CAME as a surprise to bump into Peter Darley in Dublin on Saturday. The whole-hearted Avoca captain should have been at the Ireland squad training session at Blaris. But because he has not fully recovered from the tonsillitis operation which has put him out of action since the end of November, he has withdrawn from the national panel.
Thus there will be at least one change in the squad for the World Cup second qualifying tournament in Kuala Lumpur in March compared with the 16 who played in Cagliari in October when Darley was the number two goalkeeper to Ivan Bateman. With Raymond Geddis of Lisnagarvey again unavailable, it would seem that Nigel Henderson of Pembroke Wanderers is set to make his international breakthrough.
While Henderson's Pembroke clubmates were merciless in inflicting a 13-0 defeat on Carlow in the Leinster Senior Cup at Serpentine Avenue on Saturday, Avoca lost 4-1 to Three Rock Rovers in what was a lacklustre quarter-final at Grange Road.
Because of a clash of dates, Avoca fielded seven members of the second team which had beaten RUC Il 5-1 in the Irish Junior Cup earlier in the day and ultimately they were much too drained to contain Rovers.
In retrospect, the Blackrock side could have saved some energy from the junior game (in which the RUC enjoyed their excursion to south Dublin and Davy Crawford registered the police side's first goal south of the Border).
Avoca matched Three Rock in the opening period, with Ian Keogh and Enda Gallanagh far from spent and Trevor Dagg taking everything on his shoulders. And another goalkeeper, 23-year-old Seton MacLeod from Auckland, appeared on the scene to stand in for Darley's unavailable deputy Stephen Kinsella.
MacLeod, who has played for the New Zealand under-18s, confined Rovers to a first-half equaliser by Alan Bothwell after Nigel Kingston had opened the scoring. After the interval, MacLeod was peppered with shots. Eventually, he was beaten by a penalty stroke from Liam Canning, who then sent Rick Johnson through to make it 3-1 before Robin Madeley completed the tally from a short corner. It was not a fired-up performance by Three Rock, who could afford to leave Ger Butler purely on Junior Cup duty in a 2-0 win over Annadale II.
Corinthians II - with Colin Stewart back in action with a two-goal contribution - also did well, winning 4-3 at Banbridge, while Railway Union are feeling pretty bouyant in still standing in both the Irish Senior and Junior Cups as well as the Mills Cup, in which they edged out UCD 2-0.
Here, the holders Glenanne remain strong, with veteran Eddie O'Malley notching a hat-trick in the 8-0 dismissal of Portrane.
O'Malley was missed, though, by the Glenanne second XI who went under 2-0 to Harlequins II in Cork. And a second Munster side has also reached the last eight in the Junior Cup, with Waterford beating South Antrim 4-3 at Newtown School.
