Cranagill have reached the semi final of the Irish Club Championships. The first stage of the Championships took place in Ballymoney Stadium on Sat 22 Nov. Armagh Zone were represented by St. Anthony's and Cranagill. The format was 8 groups of 4 teams with the group winners progressing to the quarter finals. Semi Finals and Final will be played next week. In the round robin group stages, St Anthony's were drawn with Spa GC from Mid Down zone, Monaghan club Clontibret and Oriel zone's Carrickmacross. The Craigavon club started well beating Spa GC by 5 shots, but then went down by 15 against Clontibret who had beaten Carrickmacross by 5 shots in their first game. In the last games of the group Spa GC beat Clontibret by 3 and St Anthony's beat Carrickmacross by 7, meaning St. Anthony's finished level on points with Clontibret but agonisingly missed out on a place in the quarter final on shot difference.
Cranagill were drawn with Conlig from North Down, St. Joseph's from Western zone and Rosslea. The locals started off with a 7 shot win against Conlig, and then followed this up with a narrow 1 shot win against St Josephs. A 3 shot win in their final game against Rosslea saw them top the group unbeaten and qualify for the quarter finals where they faced All Saints Tullylish. It was Ian Perry's rink that done the damage in this game beating Richard Martin's four 13-3. Andrew Hughes' four went down 9-6 to Johnny Wilson's rink and Terry Mulholland was beaten 9-5 by Tullylish's Andrew Leckey, but overall Cranagill had done enough for a 3 shot win and a place in the semi finals.
The other 3 semi finalists are St. Mary's Newcastle, Cookstown Pariochial and Clontibret.
