Aaron Niland struck 3-08 as Galway dispatched a wasteful Wexford side with some ease in their Leinster Under-20 hurling championship in Laois Hire O’Moore Park.<\/p>\n
Playing into high winds in the first half, Galway led 2-04 to 0-06 at the break, with Clarinbridge star Niland burying both goals, the second being rifled into the top corner after taking a pass from Vince Morgan.<\/p>\n
Wexford made poor use of the elements in the opening half hour, missing numerous chances, scoring just one point from play courtesy of Podge Doyle.<\/p>\n
Into the wind, Wexford did start the second half brightly, with points from O’Brien and Jack Nolan bringing it back to a two-point game.<\/p>\n
However, Galway eased clear again with the next three points and the game was as good as over by the 46th minute when Niland completed his hat-trick, rounding his marker and batting home from close range.<\/p>\n
Galway fell foul of the new dissent rule on 51 minutes, the hosts being awarded a 20-metre free. O’Brien went low with his effort, bouncing the ball underneath Galway net-minder Chris Callanan.<\/p>\n
But that was it from Wexford, whose wide tally hit 14 in the end. Galway tagged on 1-04 in the closing stages, substitute Harry Holmes slotting a fourth goal after being put through by Brian Callanan, the Tribesmen winning 4-13 to 1-08.<\/p>\n
Kilkenny reeled off the final six points of the game to overcome the challenge of Kildare in their Leinster opener in Hawkfield.<\/p>\n
Kildare started brightly, with a point from Tim Ryan putting them 0-03 to 0-02 ahead after 10 minutes.<\/p>\n
However, Kilkenny led by six at the break, Paddy Lacey burying a goal in the top corner from a tight angle to give the Cats a 1-07 to 0-04 lead.<\/p>\n
Tom Power rattled off four pointed frees in succession midway through the second half to bring it back to a three-point game with 15 points remaining.<\/p>\n
However, Kilkenny reeled off six in a row to assure themselves of victory, with Colm Treacy, Jack Dollard, David Barcoe, Ollie O’Donovan, Jake Mullen and finally Lacey tagging on points, the game 1-16 to 0-10 to the Cats.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in Group 2, a late point from Mark Mulrooney saw Offaly snatch a dramatic victory against Laois in O’Moore Park.<\/p>\n
Trailing by three at the break, Laois seemed to have taken the initiative in the third quarter, Cormac Byrne’s goal levelling the game after the restart, before a burst of points between the 40th and 45th minutes put them three up.<\/p>\n
Offaly battled back with points from Mulrooney, Odhran Fletcher and Andrew Horgan, leaving the match finely poised entering a chaotic endgame.<\/p>\n
Conor Headen’s goal looked to have swung the game in the hosts’ favour down the stretch but Offaly hit back with a goal immediately through Patrick Lyons.<\/p>\n
The scoring was tit-for-tat, Fletcher and Sean Carey nudging Offaly ahead, Justin Duggan and Eoin Delaney replying for Laois. But it was Mulrooney who had the final say deep in injury-time with his fourth point of the second half. Laois were unable to respond, a late equaliser attempt drifting wide.<\/p>\n
In the other Group 2 game in Parnell Park, Dublin were much too strong for Meath, winning 3-15 to 0-10.<\/p>\n
Callum Graham bagged a brace of goals in the opening 20 minutes, the Dubs leading by six points at the break.<\/p>\n
Darragh Kilduff found the net shortly after the restart and the Dubs cantered away to an easy victory, 14 points the margin in the finish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aaron Niland struck 3-08 as Galway dispatched a wasteful Wexford side with some ease in their Leinster Under-20…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382037,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-382036","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382036\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}