By Jonathan Brown
Drumaness Mills’ captain Gary Murdock described Friday night’s Irish Cup fourth-round win away to Newry City as “one of the most memorable moments” during his time at the club. Murdock, who first joined the Mills in 2007, captained his team to a famous 2-1 win at the Newry Showgrounds, with goals from Sean Paul Holland and Callum Dougan enough to take the Meadowvale men through to round five of the Irish Cup.
It was Newry who opened the scoring in the 50th minute of the match, thanks to a low strike from Keith Dalton. But it would take just three minutes for Drumaness to respond, through Holland, who headed in a magnificent cross from Kyle McCleery after a corner was initially cleared.
Newry pressed hard for a winner, but Ciaran Brannigan’s men defended resolutely, and when the Drumaness chance for a winner came, Dougan took it. A long ball up the pitch from Jack Sharvin found the forward, who collected the ball on the edge of the box before hitting a shot that squirmed past Newry keeper Jason Craughwell at his near post.
The men in yellow even had a chance for another goal, with Sharvin’s delicate lob sailing just inches wide of the mark, and after seeing out seven minutes of injury time, the Mills bench exploded with elation as they claimed a scalp over a team that was playing NIFL Premiership football in the 2023/2024 season.
The skipper believes the horrendous weather conditions in Newry played into his team’s hands. “The conditions were terrible – it was a wet, windy, cold night, which probably helped us a bit because it stopped Newry playing their free-flowing football.”
“We probably outworked them and battled harder than them, we wanted it more than them and that’s why we came out on top, I think,” Murdock said. He explained that the team took confidence from a pre-season game against Newry, which ended in a 1-1 draw, adding that manager Ciaran Brannigan had made a point of trying to expose Newry’s fragility from set pieces.
“We played them in pre-season and even though both teams were missing players that day, it showed us that Newry weren’t much better than us, and on our day, we could beat them, so we went into the game with that confidence.
“Ciaran went to watch Newry play last Friday night against Lisburn Distillery – Newry won 4-3 with two late goals, but one of the things Ciaran noted was that they conceded goals from set pieces.
“We had that in mind, that we could target them from corners, and on Friday we scored as a result of one of the few corners we got in the game. It was definitely something we worked on during the week.”
In the full story Gary goes on to say where he thinks the result stands in the history of the club.
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