Tyrone u16s took to the field at Cloghan Monaghan in the first game of the Ulster championship which was played in ideal conditions.

Having  won the toss Monaghan elected to play against  the breeze but Tyrone were soon into the stride with Keeva Owens scoring 0-2 from frees. Monaghan settled into the game replying with three points.

A superb save from C Orr fell kindly to the inrushing forward from Monaghan who kicked the ball to the net.

Tyrone began to dominate with Owens again firing over from a free. Dana Coyle got on the scoresheet with a fine point from play following  excellent support play from Clodagh McCanny linking up with Erin Daly who had replaced A Edgar.

Against the run of play Monaghan forwards played a long hopeful ball towards the Tyrone goal with Orr again getting down to save but fortunately the ball was kicked goalwards by the Monaghan full forward to the net to leave the score Monaghan 2-03 Tyrone 0-04.

The Tyrone defence then got on top with Campbell, Marianna Loughran and Concannon  blocking interceptions leading to a sweeping move from defence bypassing midfield where the Daly twins were getting more influence in the play. Grimes and  Mc Moran linked well before sending a pass through to Therese Loughran who calmly finished to the net. Half time Monaghan 2-03 Tyrone 1-04.

Tyrone started the second half attacking the Monaghan goal and capitalised on indiscipline Owens hit 0-2 from frees within the 8 minutes of the restart .

Ava Gilligan who had replaced McClean broke up another long ball attack from Monaghan linking with Therese Loughran who passed to McGinn who in turn sent a defence splitting ball through to E McDermott who fired to the net.

Monaghan hit back with a point from play with Owens replying with another point from the placed ball. It was then end to end play with Monaghan hitting 2 points from play but with defences on top and time running out Monaghan’s long ball tactics resulted in what looked like the winning score.

But to Tyrone’s credit they upped their performance for the last play of the 60 minutes with McGinn bearing down  on goal being fouled. Owens fired the resulting free to the roof of the net. Tyrone completed the scoring with another free by Owens before the referee blew the final whistle on a score of Tyrone 3-08 Monaghan 3-06.

Tyrone: C Orr D Campbell  M Loughran K Concannon C McCanny K Owens J McClean Ellie  Daly A Edgar D Coyle E  McGinn  E McDermott T Loughran I Grimes C McMoran subs Erin Daly  for A Edgar

A Gilligan for J McClean  L McCullagh forE McDermott,  E Heaney for C McCanny,  A Leonard for EMcGinn.