Larne and Portadown Battle out a worthy Stalemate in Storm Desmond

With Storm Desmond blustering up hurricane conditions across the pitch, it was difficult to establish any kicking dominance in the early stages of the game as the starting kick off from Portadown blew straight into touch.

Both sides knew in order to get their team on the front foot, it would be up to the packs to rumble the ball on, but the Larne back line had other ideas and used the ball well to add some pace into the game through backs of Marshall. Carter, Murray and Gibson.

The game, littered with knock ons and out on the full kicks, slowed the game right down, but showed great innovation at amateur level to adjust to windy conditions at lineout time - Larne benefiting from both shortened lineouts and a long overthrow into the backs by Johnston.

However Portadown responded to this and hogged the Larne try line after numerous pick and drives, but came short when defensive efforts from Williamson and Smyth held up a scoring opportunity. Half time 0-0.

The second half was almost a mirrored performance of the first, but Larne gained a penalty on the left hand side of the posts and opted to take the kick. Storm Desmond playing it's part and forced A. Gibson's attempt wide.

Fresh injection of pace from half time subs McKinty and Harvey brought more physicality to Larne's game, but evenly matched against Portadown's resources and defensive efforts.

With the full time whistle blowing at 0-0 after 80 mins, extra time was entered and another hard fought 20 mins was battled out. Neither team wanting to give up and produce some fantastic running rugby and earned a replay next week at Portadown.

Larne 3rds: A. Hyndman, C. Smyth, S. Johnston (c), A. Ferguson, M. Gilbert, J. Gingles, P. Castle, R. Williamson, R. McDowell, S. Marshall, J. Millar, J. Carter, A. Murray, M. Boston, A. Gibson, D. Harvey, G. McKinty, M. Bridges.

Larne 3rds Captain Stephen Johnston: "To play in 100 minutes of rugby and for both teams to not come out with any score, showed great determination, solid defence organisation, great running rugby in terrible conditions and the passion and desire from all 36 players involved in the game.

It's been labelled with the best performance of the season and I couldn't fault the effort in all of the 18 Larne players. It's not often you see a 0-0 game in rugby, but was well fought by both sides to try and take the win."

Dick Of The Day Moment

Dick Of the Day Moment was not won on the pitch due to a fantastic effort, but won off the pitch....

Andrew Ferguson

After showering, Andrew Ferguson walked into the changing room to ask the question "Has anyone listened to Justin Bieber's new album? It's quite different from his usual music, but it's pretty good".