Captain Invincible!

The Sky Blues laid their 'bogey' to rest at Ferney Park last night by scoring their first goal and later on winning for the first time at the Ducks ground. There was another 'first' last night, when Cookie Munster, scored his first goal of the season and in the process sent the Sky Blue fans home happy United showing only one charge from their starting line-up of last Saturday, Darboy for Spike's son Matthew, lost the toss and had to defend the end where most of the Ducks fans were situated.

The Mallards started out at a whirlwind pace, on a glorious Ferney Park surface, making incisive passes and exposing the Sky Blues defence time and time again. It seemed only a matter of time until  they opened the scoring and Ballymena had a few anxious moments in defence. Little was seen of United in attacking mode, as the Ducks defenders dealt capably with all our high balls and too many times we had 2 against 4.

The only glimmer of hope for Ballymena was Ducks keeper McCusker, who was struggling with back-passes but he only had to field a few, we didn't pressure the ducks defence enough.Just when it seemed the sky blues had weathered the Ducks storm, disaster struck when JT failed to clear the ball and the ball fell to Campbell and he swivelled and beat Addis with a crisp left-foot shot, to give the Ducks a 1-0 lead.

The Ducks continued to barrage our goal after this and Addis was relieved to see the ball finding the side-netting after a Martin shot. The Ducks were in a no nonsense mode and ref Heth let things go a bit, no yellow cards after some tasty tackles. The Mallards were running the show, dominating us in midfield, but about halfway through the half the tide began to turn somewhat. Ally, was getting a lot of stick  from people who should have known better.

I reasoned that Ally was following orders, giving Steeky some cover, but he couldn't be in two places at once, because he was lying deep. We started getting some inroads into the match on our right wing, with Gawley and Tony combining well, but it generally ended with a high ball and this was wee buns for the Ducks defence. Cometh the the hour cometh the man and this man was United Captain Alan Jenkins. The big Stranraer man started chasing seemingly lost causes and he gave us some hope when he blocked a clearance form a Ducks defender, right beside us fans.

It didn't lead to anything but it served as an example to his players and we started to get some inroads in the match. A minute later Darboy shot for goal but a Ducks  defender seemed to  punch it clear, but Heth was unmoved. This incident seemed to give United some hope, when the opposite sometimes applies and they started to exploit the Ducks left flank. But we couldn't get a telling cross in, despite Neil Gawley having the measure of fullback Hutchinson.

With the halftime whistle getting near, the Ducks don't have a Davy King, to tell what the ref added on at the end of the 45 mins, but we knew it was getting close. United mounted another attack and Gawley's cross fell to Darboy, his initial shot was parried by McCusker and Captain Jenks drove the rebound home to tie the scores at one apiece. We were ecstatic and beside ourselves with joy, for we had laid the bogey, of never having scored at Ferney Park, now all things were possible and the ref blew for half-time immediately after the restart.

2nd half

We continued where we left off in the first period, in this half and me and Sammy moved our places to see if we could get a better view of proceedings, all to little or no avail I might add. About 5 mins into the half Stafford, the Ducks centre-half was booked for a foul and Gawley's free-kick brought a great save form McCusker, with United players unable to take advantage of the rebound. The keeper made another save from Darboy and then the post came to the Ducks rescue before Tippers scored to give the Sky Blues a deserved lead, 2-1.

That goal was scored virtually the hour mark and as United threatened to run riot at this stage, the ducks picked up a spate of bookings. How their number ten stayed on the field, when he fouled JT  beggars belief, he fouled the United player and then when JT tried to get up he pushed him down again. It should have brought a second yellow at least, if not a red one. But Heth being Heth merely talked to the player and in my mind gave him leave to go on fouling which he did.

United were playing with confidence at this stage and it seemed to be little danger when Cookie decided to play the ball out of defence. But disastrously he passed to a Ducks player and they carved open the United defence and it ended up with Campbell slotting the ball past Addis to level the scores at 2 apiece. This rocked us back on our heels momentarily but Tippers found Darboy, but he shot straight at the keeper, a chance gone begging'

Then a spell of Ducks pressure, when they not for the first time, carved open the Sky Blues defence, Addis advanced from his goals to smother the ball, a crucial save. It was nip and tuck after that and the tie could have went either way, but thankfully it went the Sky Blues way. United won a free-kick on the right, with time ebbing away and Gawley's free-kick was headed clear, but we got another free-kick on the left this time. Gawley delivered it into the danger area again and it fell kindly to Cookie and he slotted the ball home from 5 yards to send Sky Blues fans into raptures of delight.

It was no more than the Sky Blues deserved and it was fitting that our oldest player had got the winner and made up for his earlier howler, in gifting the Ducks their equaliser. Fergie made his first substitution taking off Gawley and bringing on Marky to see out the 4 mins of added time that Heth seemed to have added on. When Heth finally blew his whistle, our goal-keeping coach, big Wes Lamont, ran to keeper Addis and climbed on his back, a sure indication of what the victory meant to him and summed it up for the hundreds of Sky Blue fans who made the journey to Fermanagh, it was well worth the trip, bring on the Chickenville in the final, COSB!

Addis (8), Tony (7), Steeky (8), Cookie (7), JT (7), Gawley (8) Sub: Marky 7,), Sparky (7), Jenks (8), Ally (7), Tippers (8), Darboy (7)

Man of the match: Jenks