Venue: Ballymoney

K.O. : 11am
 
Man of the Match : Louis Cafolla
Parents Man of the Match : Reece Atkinson
 
Final we get back to league football, our last game was away back on the 19th December which we won our first match and we managed to get a friendly against Bangor Rangers which we also won, so with back to back wins hopes were running high.
We left Ards at 9am to head for Ballymoney with the road conditions deteriorating rapidly there was a stage i though we would have to turn back but we drove on and got their in the end. The pitch was in very good condition considering the weather and the match got under way at 11am. We didn't start well and you could see that Ballymoney who have played matches the last to weeks were up for the match, where we were a little bit rusty due to lack of matches. Ballymoney took the lead 9 minutes in with a simple through ball which our central defence failed to deal with and in the 16th minute they made it 2 : 0 again a lack of concentration in the defence. We did have a great chance when Matthew Cunningham threaded a great ball through to Stuart Graham and as he ran through one on one with the keeper the Referee blow for offside, this was a harsh decision as Stuart was clearly onside. Stuart did have the ball in the net only for the ref to chop it off as the goal kick never cleared the box and Stuart ran in to put it into the net.
Hat-Time : 2 : 0
The second half was a far better performance and our defence certainly upped their game and were determined that nothing was get past them. With our ever reliable keeper Edward Muldrew away at camp Jai Sykes stepped in to replace him and throughout the match pulled of some great saves, well done Jai in your first match in goals. We had a few chances in the second half the best fell to the other twin Andrew Graham but he was unable to keep his shot on target.
Summary being is the boys are improving every week the only down side was such a long layoff meant they were a little bit rusty but performed quite well over the 60 minutes.