Ryan and Darbey’s Towers’ double act

ROUND Tower got their AHL Division 3 campaign off to a great start with 2-10 to 0-13 win over Naomh Mearnog at Monastery Road.
Towers go into the league season pushing to secure a second promotion in four years after breaching the top five in the division for the last two seasons. The opening exchanges saw wides from both sides before Alex Darbey struck the first point of the game from a free after five minutes.
Darbey struck another free shortly afterwards before Mearnog pucked over the best score of the game so far on 13 minutes. Towers went 0-3 to 0-1 up and it was from the hurl of Darbey once again. It came from a great interception from Shane Cross at corner back, who then found Gary Quinlivan and subsequently Darbey.
Mearnog struck back instantly but Eoin Walsh followed up that score with one of his own from midfield.
Darbey was handed another opportunity from a free after a foul on Luke Currivan but this time he was narrowly wide. His third point of the game did come two minutes later, however, to restore a three-point advantage.
Mearnog got themselves level with three unanswered points but Darbey struck twice more before half-time to leave the score at 0-7 to 0-5 going into the break.
Towers got the first score of the second half when full-forward Eoin Ryan set up Currivan, but Mearnog pointed twice to make it a one-point game.
Ryan and Currivan combined again and when the former was pushed over, Darbey scored the resulting free.
With the game still finally balanced 12 minutes into the second half, Towers struck a big blow when Walsh cut inside his marker from the right and fired past the keeper.
Mearnog got themselves back into the game with three points before Ryan got his side’s second goal with 10 minutes left on the clock.
The visitors tried in desperation to respond but the goals proved too much, and Darbey’s late free was the last action of the game.