Mayo derby win for U16 Boys

The boy in green travelled up the road to Castlebar for a refixed U16 league game on Friday night.
The squad was tight in numbers and management are still building a squad ethic, so there was a sense of the unexpected about the whole adventure.
From the outset, Castlebar attacked and drove deep into Ballina territory and were held up just short of the line. The Moy boys were rattled by this and realised they were in a game. Slowly they settled to the task, but the home side encouraged by their early success, kept coming, however the Ballina defence held and suddenly after a turnover, Sam Callinan gathered the ball and set off down the right wing before cutting inside to touch down under the posts. The try was converted by David Feeney for a 0-7 lead.
From the kick-off the home side came looking again but the Moy boys prevailed, gathering the ball again and Fiachna Barrett ripped open the home side again to touch down and suddenly the lead was out to 0-14.
Once again, the home side gathered themselves and focused on spreading the ball wide and driving up field. They were rewarded when a penalty was awarded for offside and the boys in blue crashed over the line to close the gap to 5-14.
Ballina needed to respond and did so before the half time whistle when Ciaran Boland also struck from deep and crossed the line under the posts for a 5-21 advantage at the change of ends.
After the resumption the visitors settled to their task with Fiachna Barrett crossing twice more and Darragh Walsh driving over beside the posts to extend the lead to 5-42.
The home side decided that enough was enough at that stage and as the visitors relaxed and management implemented positional changes, the blue boys drove home the advantage going over out wide following a scrum for a 10-42 tally.
The victory means that Ballina closed the gap at the top of the league, but they will need to tighten up their mental approach and utilise all their abilities while on the pitch if they wish their season to be successful.
The next challenge will be Sligo away. Under new management this year, the Sligo boys have been rejuvenated and are in flying form after a fine win away against league leaders Ballinasloe, so this will be a hum-dinger where Ballina will be tested to the very limit.