City of Armagh faced Highfield in glorious sunshine with a couple of changes in the team. Out half Owen O’Kane was at an Irish training panel and he was replaced at number 10 by Rocky Olsen. The backline was also boosted by the first appearance of winger Aitzol Arenzana- King, an Ulster academy player, playing his first game in 14 months. John Glasgow fresh from his trip to the far east came back onto the sub’s bench.
Highfield started off very positively and went into an early 6-0 lead with a couple of penalties from their impressive outhalf, Buckley. Earlier Rocky had an impressive 50-22 but there was an overthrow at the lineout and Highfield cleared their lines. Armagh were guilty of giving away soft penalties and Buckley increased their lead with a penalty when Niall Carville was penalised for offside Things got worse for Armagh when Noah Bell had to leave the field and Jonny Morton who was having a good game in the loose, had to follow him with a hard knock to the head.
Armagh got themselves back into the game through a typical Neary try when he barged over from 5 metres out for an opportunist try at the posts. Olsen converted to leave the scoreline 9-7 in Highfield’s favour. 35 minutes gone and Armagh were penalised again close to their posts through hooker Fehnert not rolling away from a tackle resulting in 12-7 to Highfield.
Armagh were not to be denied though and after a series of drives to the line, Olsen called for the ball on the short side and used his pace to dive over in the corner for a well taken try. As a bonus Rocky converted from the touchline to put Armagh into the lead, 14-12 at halftime.
In the second half Highfield had very little of the ball with Armagh on the front foot most of the time. After a series of mauls close to the Highfield line, James Anderson burrowed over for Armagh’s third try. Rocky could not convert but had little difficulty in slotting over two penalties to stretch the scoreline to 25-12. Highfield tried hard to get back into the game but were met with a very determined Armagh defence. This was coupled with 3 jackals from veteran, James Morton, Niall Carville and the impressive Curtis Pollock. Tried as much as they could, Armagh could not get the 4th bonus try as their lineout began to wobble through crooked throws. They therefore had to settle for 4 points and preventing Highfield from getting any.
