Late fightback not enough for students | Brian Barry

UCC 17Midleton 19New season, new league, and a lot of new faces for UCC. As is the trend in recent years, the UCC Senior rugby team will have to deal with a high player turnover as a number of last year’s first XV choose to play for their home clubs at an earlier stage of their careers. On Saturday, Luke Cahill, former UCC player, lined up with the visitors at the Mardyke.Heading into the game with the momentum from the previous week’s bonus point 45-15 win over City of Derry, UCC started where they left off with a third minute try from winger Conor Barry, having been released down the wing by Kevin Slater. Out-half Sean Og Murphy pushed the conversion wide at the near post from wide on the left to leave the hosts 5-0 up.However, Midleton grew into the game and were rewarded for good pressure with a penalty which Paul Daly duly slotted over from wide left. The East Cork outfit became more and more dominant at the set-piece, but were struggling to make it count on the scoreboard. UCC were holding their own however in open play with Slater looking a constant threat.Daly was offered a chance to put the visitors ahead in the 28th minute, which he missed, after the students were caught not releasing in a ruck. The game slowed down as the half drew to an end, before Midleton took a quick penalty in the opposition half, and with space in front of them, UCC centre Daniel Horgan wisely impeded the onrushing players even though he was not back the required ten metres. He was shown a yellow card for his troubles, as the hosts went in 6-5 down at the break.Facing into the first ten minutes of the second half with just 14 men, the home side coped well to ride out the storm as it remained 6-5. The introduction of Cork senior hurler Darren Sweetnam, who signed a professional contract with Munster during the week, added spice to the UCC back-play.As the half wore on however, Midleton established a stronger foothold in the game. Out-half Daly's pass was intercepted by a player coming back from an offside position deep in UCC territory which handed the visitors an easy penalty, which was converted to stretch the lead to four.After the penalty, a host of substitutions were made on both sides, including the introduction of former Munster player Jason Holland for the visitors. He essentially was the difference between the sides as he intercepted a pass to run in for Midleton's first try and had the composure ten minutes later to step back and send over a dropkick to put his team virtually out of sight at 19-5.But there was fight in UCC yet as Daniel Horgan ran in on the right in the dying moments of the game, for what seemed to be a consolation try. Sean Og Murphy failed with his conversion attempt. Straight off the kick-off, the students looked to attack again. Remarkably, they found time for one more as the impressive Sweetnam ran under the posts to rescue a losing bonus point. Murphy converted to leave the final score at 19-17.UCC: J Holland; S Romandi, K Slater, D Horgan, C Barry; S Og Murphy, D Foley; P McCabe, C Stokes, B Scott, B Quill, D McSweeney, C Gallagher, J McCarthy, W Ryan (C). Subs: M O'Mahony, S Moynihan, D O'Connell, C O'Regan, D Sweetnam.