Mount Anville 0 Wesley College 0: For the second year running Wesley College lost out in the Leinster Premier League final at Grange Road, but while last year's 4-0 defeat to St Andrews was probably easy enough to accept - Andrews, after all, were a class above everyone last season - yesterday's loss will have been much harder to bear.
Having dominated much of the game, hitting the woodwork twice, Wesley lost 3-1 on penalty strokes to a Katie Hutch-inspired Mount Anville team whose defence, just as it had been in the semi-final against High School, was simply immense.
And it needed to be. For much of normal and extra-time the Wesley attacking combination of Mayla Lambert and Wendy Adams was an unrelenting menace, while captain Eimear Richardson, the elegant and skilful sweeper who is also a member of the Irish cricket elite squad preparing for the World Cup next March, was a constant threat from set-pieces.
It was Richardson who first struck the woodwork in the 36th minute, her short corner strike coming off the right post. And she must have concluded it really wasn't going to be her school's day when, two minutes from the end of extra time, Sophie Blennerhassett deflected another Richardson shot from a short corner on to the crossbar.
Four times Adams went close to scoring for Wesley, as did Jennie Fair once, while Mount Anville goalkeeper Blathnaid Conroy Murphy had to be sharp to deny Lambert and Maeve Galvin.
It wasn't, though, all one way traffic. Mount Anville forced four short corners to Wesley's six, with Louise Johnston behind most of their best attacking work down the left wing.
But Mount Anville had to endure waves of Wesley attacks, most of them thwarted by Katherine Staunton and Caroline Davis, with a string of timely tackles, blocks and interceptions, and on the rare occasion Staunton and Davis were bypassed, Caroline Davis and Keva Graham provided a second defensive shield.
Hutch, though, looked a class apart. Nominally a "left-mid", she turned up wherever and whenever she was most needed, most notably midway through the second half when she brilliantly blocked a goal-bound shot from Richardson.
Fittingly, she converted the first stroke of the shoot-out, after Conroy-Murphy had saved Wesley's first effort. Two more successful conversions by Anne Cunningham and Davis proved enough to win the day after Wesley failed to put away two of their next three strokes.
In summary: Wesley were desperately unlucky; but Mount Anville were fantastically plucky.
MOUNT ANVILLE: B Conroy-Murphy, A O'Malley, K Staunton, C Davis, K Graham, S Lee, A Cunningham, J Gilligan, L Johnston, A O'Donnell, K Hutch (capt). Subs: L Swaine, A Prendiville, E Gray.
WESLEY COLLEGE: S Byrne, E Richardson (capt), S Blennerhassett, J Boate, L Martin, J Fair, C Hearndon, J Latham, N Clarke, M Lambert, W Adams. Subs: R Scott, C Delap, M Galvin, J Tutty, S Davis.
Umpires: SA Fanagan and G Walsh.
