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EMYVALE

Monaghan V Down - McKenna Cup Semi-final.

The 2013 McKenna Cup Semi-finals were played as a double header in the Athletic Grounds, Armagh, on Sunday, January 20th 2013. It was a cold wet day with heavy sleet showers throughout but that did not deter a good crowd of spectators from turning out to support their teams.

First up was Monaghan V Down and it looked as if Down was going to take the final slot even though there was little to separate them on the scoreboard for most of the game. Down seemed to handle the tricky condition best and the Monaghan boys were constantly making silly mistakes and giving away possession. They were level at the interval but Monaghan had lost fullback, Drew Wylie, through injury. Drew received his award as Player of the Year at the Northern Standard Annual Awards on Saturday night.
The second half had a little more action as both sides upped the tempo but mistakes were still aplenty. Down lost a man to a second yellow early in the half but Monaghan struggled to take any benefit from that. In the final quarter Monaghan lost Karl O’Connell to a second yellow and it looked like a Down win by a single point. However with sudden urgency Monaghan began to put moves together and when Conor McManus equalised with minutes left Monaghan was a new team. Surging forward and getting the ball about 35 meters out, after a number of good forward passes, Darren Hughes had the confidence to go for the score and with a side of the boot kick the ball spun in an arc to pass between the posts to give them the advantage. There was still time for Down to come back and they tried but the Monaghan defence stood firm and started another forward push and once again they plkayed the best football of the day and with purpose and Darren got another opportunity from about the same place and once again spun it over to clinch the passage to the final. Final score - Monaghan 1 - 12 to Down 0 - 13.
In the second game Tyrone defeated Fermanagh by 2 - 9 to 0 - 7 which means that Monaghan face Tyrone in the final next Saturday evening at 7.30pm in the Athletic Grounds.