The Carrick 1st XV lost to Academy by 27 points to 16 at Tom Simms Memorial Park on Saturday 23rd November. After the demolition of Strabane and a full blooded performance against Ballyclare in previous weeks, this was a poor performance by the Maxol-sponsored Carrick side. Against fourteen men for most of the game, after Academy lost their open side in the early stages, Carrick never managed to establish any sort of control, conceded two tries through poor defending and never really threatened the line themselves apart from when lazy kick chasing by the visitors allowed Aaron McKinney to score on the counter early in the second half. For most of the Carrick players it was a game to forget; once again, it was the back row trio of Curtis Rea, Chris Ferris and Neil Marsden who performed best for Carrick although there was some strong driving play from second rows Andy Kincaid and Chris Rodgers and Luke Whitall again had a good game with the boot.
Carrick started well and took the lead with a Luke Whitall penalty after two minutes. This followed strong runs by Chris Rodgers and Andy Kincaid leading to an Academy offence at the break-down. The lead was short-lived, however and the visitors levelled the scores with a penalty of their own a few minutes later. Academy then took the lead on seventeen minutes when they won a scrum on the Carrick put-in inside the home side’s 22 and moved the ball left for their powerful inside centre to break two tackles and go over. The try was not converted but Carrick continued to make life relatively easy for the visitors by conceding a series of penalties and turnovers and with some fairly aimless kicking. They did narrow the deficit with another Luke Whitall penalty after thirty minutes but Academy hit back with with a pushover try five minutes later. This was converted to give the visitors a 15 points to 6 lead. From the kick-off, a big hit by Chris Ferris led to a penalty to Carrick which Whitall duly converted and the sides went into the break with Academy leading by 15 points to 9.
For the first seven minutes of the second half, the visitors looked totally on top, aided by some very sloppy play by Carrick but, against the run of play, the home side took the lead in the eighth minute. An Academy chip through the Carrick defence was chased much too tentatively by the visitors’ mid-field players and Aaron McKinney gathered and raced fifty metres to score under the posts. Luke Whitall added the conversion points to put Carrick ahead by 16 points to 15. After this, the home side had probably their best period of the match, having the majority of possession and making ground through some strong driving play by Andy Kincaid and others. However, their one foray into the “red zone” ended in a penalty to the visitors.Then, with fifteen minutes left, Carrick failed to deal with a high kick, Academy drove into their 22 , re-cycled and their inside centre again broke through at least two Carrick tackles to score.The try was not converted but the home side were now chasing the game and ended up turning the ball over in their one incursion into the visitors 22. For the last few minutes, the visitors were on the attack and, when Carrick tried to run from their own line, they lost control of the ball and Academy pounced to score . This try was converted and the visitors held out comfortably in the remaining few minutes of injury time for their deserved 27 points to 16 victory.
This was a poor performance by Carrick after the promise shown in the two previous games and they will have to improve considerably if they are to repeat their home win against Grosvenor when they travel to Belmont on Saturday.
The Carrick team against Academy was:-
A. McKinney; N. Hastings, J. Cullen, J. Sheriff, B. Alexander; L. Whitall, K. Topping; E. Peacock, N. Hanna, R. Williams, A. Kincaid(Capt), C. Rodgers, N. Marsden, C. Ferris, C. Rea.
