Big guns knocked out of McCalmont Cup

It was a chaotic weekend of McCalmont Cup action with city sides Evergreen and Freebooters both eliminated with Fort Rangers and Castlewarren Celtic causing big shocks.

Evergreen lost out to Division One outfit Fort Rangers with the drama of penalties eventually settling the tie in the Cuffesgrange based outfit’s favour.

It turned out to be a thrilling knockout encounter and despite Mikey Drennan and Declan McQuillan twice putting the league champions in front, Fort Rangers battled back on both occasions through goals from Chris Phelan and Eddie Nugent as the game went to penalty kicks on the back of a final 2-2 scoreline.

Fort Rangers goalkeeper Craig Cummins was the star of the hour as he produced four brilliant saves as his team claimed a shock shootout success.

Joint manager of the team Jim Nugent was elated when speaking to us after the game.

“We went 1-0 down after four or five minutes but we spoke to the lads in the dressing room and told them not to drop the heads if something like that happened.

“We fought back and we kept plugging away and it was a battle then all the way to penalties before our ’keeper Craig Cummins pulled off a number of great saves.

“The pitch was hard and we used our full squad of five subs so we were delighted to get through it.”

Listen to the full interview with Jim and Emmet Nugent below.

It wasn’t the only cup upset on Sunday either after Castlewarren got the better of Freebooters at the former home of Kilkenny City in Buckley Park.

Niall and Eoin Delaney both scored to keep tabs with their former ’Booters teammates before Killian Duffy scored the winner as Castlewarren emerged 3-2 winners.

Elsewhere Thomastown United came away from Callan with a 2-1 success to round off the last 32 with the next round due to take place in a couple of weeks time.

There was also league fare on show with one game in the Junior St Canice’s Credit Union Premier Division as bottom side Deen Celtic fell to a heavy 6-1 defeat at the hands of Bridge United.

The win moves Bridge within three points of league leaders Freebooters with Evergreen ominously lurking in behind with a game in hand.

Lower down the grades, Newpark and Lions A both had wins in the Junior KCLR Scoreline.ie Division One League while the Junior Division 2 Emerald Tiles League proved to be a bit of a goalfest with the highlight being Evergreen C’s 6-4 win over River Rangers.