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A very exciting quarter final out in Walkinstown this morning. With Castleknock seeming wide awake from the warm up it was an excellent start to the match showing some great team football all over the pitch. A great early free kick saw Manortown take the lead. Castleknock answered quick keeping their composure most of the time. They were rewarded for this when Hakim Maloui broke through their defence and scored from just at the 18 yard box bringing us back level. Both teams fought hard both trying to catch the next break and both keepers were kept very busy. Some brave goalkeeping from Ethan Hoey coming out as a sweeper for us on a couple of different occasions meant that the defence had the confidence to settle and support up front. It was Castleknock who got the next goal when some great defending and ball out from Fred Mutawe saw Eoin Behan through with the ball he laid it off to Hakim on the edge of the box whose shot was blocked but Oisin Dunne was the first to react and fired the ball into the back of the net. Castleknock were in again when another great through ball from Eoin saw Hakim in and this time his shot was straight in to the bottom corner. 3-1 at half time.
The second half started with Manortown coming out strong and they kept plugging away. Some strong defending from Fred, Alex, Cillian and Louis kept them out for as long as they could but Manortown were rewarded with two goals in quick succession bringing it back to 3-3. Castleknock created a lot of chances and were unlucky with some of their efforts but the Manortown goalkeeper was well up for the game. Great battling from Saul, Patrick, Oisin and Marcus in midfield really kept the game tight. Manortown were the next to score when Castleknock couldn’t deal with a long ball over the top and the forward ran on and knocked it calmly passed Ethan. Castleknock never let their determination stop and continued to fight. All their efforts were rewarded when Oleg hanged his game from playmaking to attacking and got two amazing goals one after the other making it 5-4 to Castleknock. Manortown again played the ball over the top and some lovely link up play between the winger and the striker got through our defence and they grabbed one back to make it 5-5. Castleknock should have put the game to bed when Hakim battled to win the ball off the keeper and scored from the impact. Unfortunately the ref gave a free out against Hakim and gave him his second booking leaving Castleknock with ten men heading in to extra time.
Extra time started and you could see the tiredness start to kick in from both sides. Castleknock dug deep and were really there for each other throughout. First half ended with nobody grabbing the winner. The second half Castleknock fought and fought and were rewarded when a ball through to Oleg saw Castleknock 6-5 up and a seriously stressful last 5 minutes for supporters. Castleknock held on and got their reward when the referee blew the final whistle sending Celtic through to the semi-final of the O’Leary cup. Well done to everyone involved and a big thank you to the support on the side-line it really helped the boys see out the game.
