Donegal Hurlers made it three wins from three despite a late Wicklow fightback in the National League Division 2B in Aughrim.
Donegal were without Declan Coulter, Richie Ryan and Michael Donoghue from the team that beat Sligo and despite leading by ten points at half-time, were made battle all the way by a strong second-half resurgence for Wicklow in Aughrim.
Davin Flynn was Donegal’s Man of the Match converting vital scores throughout the game, the last five of those in the final quarter after Wicklow had staged that strong second-half comeback.
Davin Flynn from a free and a 65 and Conor O’Grady gave Mickey McCann’s side an early three point lead.
John Doyle got one back for the hosts but a Ronan McDermott, in his 100th appearance for Donegal drilled a fine goal into the net to give Donegal a commanding 5 point lead after 15 minutes.
Seanie Germaine converted a Wicklow free but then Donegal hit 1-4 without reply. Davin Flynn got his third point before Bernard Lafferty stepped up to the plate with 1-1 in a matter of minutes.
Points from Gerry Gilmore and Daire Ó Maoileidigh would mean Donegal would go into the break with a comfortable lead at 2-7 to 0-3 but it was far from game over.
Torna Mulconry scored while Doyle from play and a Germaine free got Wicklow right back into contention.
It got even better for the home side minutes later when Mark Murphy pointed from long range and then Kieran Harmon set up Seanie Germaine to hammer home their second goal, only two points in it now and very much game on, 2-6 to 2-8
Judging off the score it would have been fair to assume Wicklow had the slight breeze in their favour in the second half but that wasn’t the case and Donegal made the most of whatever wind assistance there was as their points scoring in the next period of play saw them over the line.
Davin Flynn and Germaine exchanged frees and Conor O’Grady scored from play to leave three in it, 2-7 to 2-10.
Ó Maoileidigh and Flynn had points from play made it a five point game and Germaine and Flynn again exchanged points from frees, 2-8 to 2-13.
Flynn added his seventh point from a free to leave six between them but almost immediately John Toomey blasted in Wicklow’s third goal and the lead was down to just three yet again, 3-08 v 2-14.
That makes it three wins in a row for Mickey McCann’s men with two games, home to Derry next week and then away to old rivals Mayo on March 20th.
