Cork Constitution’s title defence suffered another blow as Terenure College completed a superb double over Brian Hickey’s men at Lakelands Park.
Terenure moved back into the top four and Con slipped to sixth in the table, following two Craig Adams tries in a tense 13-6 home victory.
‘Nure lost Cathal Marsh to an injury during the warm-up, but James Thornton was a more than able deputy. Nonetheless, he watched his opposite number, Con captain Aidan Moynihan, kick the visitors into a second-minute lead.
In a scrappy first half, clear-cut opportunities were hard to come by and ‘Nure had to wait until the 38th minute for their breakthrough try.
Adams raced over on the left wing following some excellent approach work from Luke Clohessy and Adam La Grue. Con were then left ruing a late decision to go for touch when they were subsequently turned over.
Con had a further setback in the 54th minute when flanker Mike Casey was sin-binned, and from a kick through by La Grue a few minutes later, Adams showed great pace to ground the ball before the end line.
The post denied Thornton’s conversion and although a Moynihan penalty pulled it back to 10-6, Thornton had the final say with a well-struck kick from the right.