St Mary's and Naomh Padraig fancied to advance to the last four of the JFC

With Carndonagh and Naomh Ultan having already booked their places in the semi-final of the Donegal JFC championship, this weekend will see two more teams join them as four sides battle it out in the hope of keeping their championship dreams alive.  

In the quarter-finals, St Mary’s Convoy will face Urris, while Naomh Padraig Uisce Chaoin will do battle with Naomh Bríd as they look to make the last four spot in this competition.  

St Mary’s Convoy along with Carndonagh and Naomh Ultan are the only unbeaten teams of the remaining six sides with the Convoy team taking an unbeaten run into this Saturday’s last eight clash with Urris who finished in third place behind Group B the runners-up Naomh Padraig Uisce Chaoin. 

St Mary’s completed the group level on league points with Carndonagh but ended up in second place because of Carndonagh’s much superior score difference of plus-83, compared to St Mary’s of plus-23.  

Having competed in the Division 3 league final earlier this season, St Mary’s, along with Carndonagh and Naomh Padraig, the only Division 2 side in the championship, were the fancied teams before a ball was even kicked.  

And on the back of their unbeaten run, and with players of the calibre of Oran Patterson, Liam and Johnny Toye, Ciaran Dolan, Anthony Browne, and Corrie Lee Bogan, St Mary’s have may a little too much firepower to see off Urris.  

But Alan Friel has taken over the manager's job and has got Urris back on track after a couple of disappointing seasons.  

Urris won two of their four games in the league stage and they have players like Kieran Kelly, Gavin McDaid, Luke Devlin, Paddy Doherty, Tiernan McDonald, and Eddie Kelly to ask questions of St Mary’s. 

In the other match, Naomh Padraig Uisce Chaoin have enjoyed a good season so far. They retained their Division 2 status while drawing impressive results against top senior championship sides, including Four Masters and St Naul’s.  

County man Caolan McColgan has finally left his injury woes behind and has returned to action in recent weeks in top-class form and is playing in a free role from corner-forward and he has already shown he has a good eye for a goal on his return having netted three times in his two outings. 

Manager Daniel McCauley has added the much-traveled Dougie Corbett to his coaching team and Naomh Padraig has a more settled look about them at this point. 

But they are coming up against a side in Naomh Bríd who Corbett knows too well as a former manager, with the Ballintra men terribly unfortunate this season to not make promotion, a side that lost out to Cloughaneely in a Division 3 promotion/relegation play-off earlier in the summer. 

They have a championship tradition and if Naomh Padraig drop off the pace Naomh Bríd are capable of causing and upset.