Despite a fine display in the opening half, Newmarket disappointingly fell short in the third quarter as Lyre ran out convincing winners by 0-17 to 1-5 in a Ducon Cup encounter played at a sunny Banteer venue on Sunday morning.

This was Newmarket’s initial outing of the season and they got off to an ideal start as a superbly taken free by Nicky Flanagan opened the scoring in the second minute. Newmarket began brightly and despite an eighth minute equalizer, they enjoyed bright passages of play in the early exchanges. Unfortunately, several chances went a begging before Matthew Fitzpatrick rewarded the enterprising play as he drilled over a fine point midway through the half. Lyre fashioned an equalizer and at this stage, Newmarket were guilty of gifting their opponents several opportunities through unforced errors which were duly punished on the scoreboard as Lyre added a further three points.

Nicky Flanagan added his second point before Lyre notched their sixth score of the half. Daniel Culloty completed the scoring with an excellently executed point as Lyre led 0-6 to 0-4 at half time.

As the second half unfolded, Newmarket’s level of performance dipped spectacularly and again errors were punished as Lyre reeled off eight points in succession to establish a match winning advantage. Newmarket toiled valiantly but the forwards saw sparse action with Nicky Flanagan eventually bringing an end to their famine with a pointed free ten minutes from time. A confident Lyre outfit added to their stock as another brace of points were put on the scoreboard. The margin at this stage was harsh on Newmarket and they went about redeeming the matter with a brilliantly taken goal by the impressive Steven Stokes. He latched onto a flick from Nicky Flanagan and stormed in on goal with a rampaging solo run before crashing the ball to the net in spectacular fashion. Lyre added one final point but there were a number of positives for a Newmarket side to build on for the season ahead.

The Newmarket team and scorers…

Steven Stokes (1-0), Nicky Flanagan (0-3), Matthew Fitzpatrick (0-1), Daniel Culloty (0-1).

Shane McAuliffe
Michael O’Leary		Mark Murphy		Robert Stack
Conor Cronin		Kevin O'Connor		Stephen Stokes
	Timothy Murphy		Jonathan Flaherty
Ian Flanagan		Michael Kenneally		Matthew Fitzpatrick
Daniel Culloty		Nicky Flanagan		Barry O'Connor
Subs: Kevin O’Sullivan, Colin Stack, Gavin Forde, Alan Ryan