McAtamney goal earns narrow win for Juniors

Town Juniors U16s Lisburn League team continued their winning form on Saturday with a 1-0 victory over Hillsborough at Ballymacoss.
5 March 2014; A general view of a football. UEFA Under 21 Championship Qualifier, Republic of Ireland v Montenegro, Tallaght Stadium, Tallaght, Co. Dublin. Picture credit: Piaras O Midheach / SPORTSFILE5 March 2014; A general view of a football. UEFA Under 21 Championship Qualifier, Republic of Ireland v Montenegro, Tallaght Stadium, Tallaght, Co. Dublin. Picture credit: Piaras O Midheach / SPORTSFILE
5 March 2014; A general view of a football. UEFA Under 21 Championship Qualifier, Republic of Ireland v Montenegro, Tallaght Stadium, Tallaght, Co. Dublin. Picture credit: Piaras O Midheach / SPORTSFILE

With a victory imperative to keep up with the league pace-setters, the Juniors turned in a solid performance.

Banbridge began slowly and put themselves under unnecessary early pressure with some misplaced passes and persistent fouling.

However, nothing too troublesome for Leckey in goal materialised from the set pieces and the Juniors eventually settled down into their rhythm.

With chances few and far between at both ends, it took a superb defence splitting pass from McKinstry to set McAtamney free on the left wing and he finished superbly into the bottom corner with a sweet left foot strike.

The second half saw Banbridge dominate the early exchanges and after a few changes by the management, the Juniors began to find a few spaces in behind the Hillsborough defence and Byrne and Irwin both went close on two occasions.

But with McAtamney dominating the exchanges in midfield and the defence of Fitzsimmons, Morgan, Ellison and Downey in control at the back, Hillsborough were limited to very few chances.

With the first clean sheet of the season the locals can go into next week’s clash with early pacesetters Lisburn Distillery with renewed confidence and a win will be vital to close the gap on the league leaders.

TOWN U16: Leckey, Fitzsimmons, Morgan, Ellison, Downey, Fearon, Houston, McKinstry, McAtamney, McCann, McKibben, Devlin, Burke, Rafferty, Irwin, Byrne.

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