Leinster Schools: Cistercian College Roscrea 24 Presentation College Bray 16

An attacking edge proved essential in Donnybrook yesterday for CistercianCollege, Roscrea, who held off Presentation College, Bray’s strong challenge to book their place in the Leinster Schools’ Junior Cup semi-final.

Pres Bray opened the scoring with a superb 13th-minute penalty by scrum-half Elliott Ryan, but thanks to well-worked converted tries by forward duo James Corcoran and Kevin Fitzgerald, Roscrea developed a 14-3 interval lead.

Indeed, a commanding victory was on the cards for the Tipperary-based school when centre pairing Jay Culliton and Adi Donovan crossed the whitewash upon the resumption.

Bray did forge an impressive fight-back in the closing 20 minutes of the action, as the excellent Ryan followed his seven-point salvo with a brace of place-kicks. Yet, despite coming under intense pressure for the majority of the final-quarter, Roscrea progressed to the next phase.

Scorers for Cistercian College Roscrea: J Corcoran, K Fitzgerald, J Culliton, A Donovan try each, E Browne 2 cons.

Scorers for Presentation College Bray: E Ryan try, 3 pens, con.

CISTERCIAN COLLEGE ROSCREA: R O’Halloran; B Murphy, J Culliton, A Donovan, R Deacy; E Browne, L Crowley; R Lomas, J Cahir, K Fitzgerald; D Maher, D Power; M Milne, J Corcoran, L Rigney.

Replacements: D Loughnane for Maher (47).

PRESENTATION COLLEGE BRAY: A Walsh; A Conway, J Vance, N Cummins, R Byrne; M O’Gara, E Ryan; T Harbison, N Groves, B Mercado; J McGrath, L Lupton-Smith; S Graham, C McKay, J McLaughlin.

Replacements: E Martin for Mercado (48), S O’Dowd for Byrne (52), E Martin for Groves, L Merrigan for Lupton-Smith, S Myler for Graham (all 60).

Referee: T Townsend (Leinster Rugby Referees).