Villa 3-3 Evergreen (Kilkenny)
(Villa win 5-4 on penalties)
Absolutely fantastic battling performance from the squad today combining super football with a never say die attitude.
We started brightly and opened the scoring when Conor McCabe finished well from a Caoilainn Foley cross. We were two up shortly afterwards when some great work from Jake O’ Halloran set up Bassit Ishola to slot home. We continued to dominate the first half and should have been further ahead but late into first half stoppage time Evergreen scored after a long free kick. Again we started the second half very well and had 3/4 chances to score before Evergreen broke and equalised. All square at full time, it was the first half of extra time when Evergreen took the lead from a free kick when we were reduced to 10 men. Down a man and with time running out the lads kept battling and with the final kick of the game Bassit Ishola scored his second of the game following a David Igwe pull back. The first 9 penalties in a row were all converted confidently before Evergreen missed their 5th kick putting us through to the Regional final. Penalty scorers were Conor McCabe, Caolainn Foley, Diego Hartnett, David Igwe and Jake Coffey. Special mention to Mikey Carroll and Tom Spain who both gave outstanding performances as did the whole squad today.