Armagh seconds played Instonians seconds in a league game at the palace grounds on Saturday. The game started off at a frantic pace with the young Inst team showing their intentions from the kick off by running the ball at every opportunity. Inst scored a try wide out after 5 minutes through their pacy winger and with the added points Armagh found themselves 7-0 down. After the team re-asserting themselves, Mathew Steenson converted a difficult penalty from 35 metres to bring the score to 7-3, however an easier chance was missed shortly after. Worse was to follow 15 minutes later when Armagh were defending their line with a 5 metre lineout. A loose tap back was greatfully accepted by the Inst No 7 who dropped over the line for the softest of tries. With the successful conversion and a scoreline of 14-3 to Inst after 25 minutes, Armagh knew they had to raise their game and cut the supply of ball to the dangerous Inst backs. The forwards led by vice captain Gareth McNeice, Andrew Smyth and the outstanding James Hanna put the squeeze on the Inst 8 and started to dominate the scrums and lineouts. From a scrum 20 metres out, Chris Wallace picked up and burst through 2 tackles to score a well deserved try. With the conversion missed, this brought Armagh back into the game and left the half time score at 14-8.
Playing down the slope in the second half, the game plan was to play a territorial game and capitalise on any scoring opportunities. An early penalty chance was accepted by Steenson to add 3 points to the Armagh tally. 14-11 to Inst. At this stage of the game the Armagh forwards were working their socks off and only good defence by Inst kept their line intact. However with 10 minutes left, prop Jason McMahon powered over in the corner to give Armagh a deserved lead for the first time 16-14. Shortly after the restart Armagh took play into the Inst 22 and after several plays by both forwards and backs, a ruck was formed out wide, 15 metres out. The ball popped out on the Armagh side and unfortunately lay unclaimed until a quick thinking Inst forward snapped it up. The ball was recycled and quickly moved up the pitch until the move was deemed to be stopped illegally by the referee and a penalty awarded 30 metres out in front of the posts. This was duly converted to put Inst back in front and the game ended shortly afterwards with a fulltime score of 17 -16 to Inst. The poor start to the game by Armagh was to be costly with the team slow to adjust to the pace of the game. However, even with players missing from last week, this game could easily have ended in a win for the home side if the team had applied themselves in the first 20 minutes of the game.
