The Wee Glens took on Cliftonville Olympic, at the Bet McLean Oval on Saturday, in the last 16 of the Steel & Sons Cup. Willie Garrett, Jordan Jenkins, Ben Cushnie and Aaron Wightman brought a wealth of experience to the Glens starting eleven. That said, in the first minute Cliftonville got off to a flyer catching the Glens cold with some intricate play down the left flank resulting in Cliftonville’s Josh Montgomery getting in behind Jonny Russell, before bending the ball past Kai Beck in the Glens goals to put the Reds ahead.
Cliftonville kept targeting the Glens left hand side with Jonny Russell continually caught up in the thick of the early action. In the ninth minute, Jonny put in a perfectly timed crunching tackle on Conor Scannell which Scannell took great exception to, hitting out at young Jonny and receiving a worthy straight red card for his actions.
Aaron Wightman and Jordan Jenkins
The rest of the half saw Cliftonville’s early attacking energy shift to a more defensive set up with two banks of four, sitting deep and ultimately frustrating the Wee Glens.
Halftime Glentoran Seconds 0 - 1 Cliftonville Olympic
The Seconds came out in the second half and completely dominated the play from kick-off. however, Cliftonville continued to frustrate them with their well drilled defensive set up holding out attack after attack.
It wasn’t until the seventieth minute, when in form Jordan Jenkins was brought down in Cliftonville’s box, that the Glens levelled the score, Aaron Wightman stepping up to unleash an almost perfect penalty.
For the next twenty minutes Norman Kelly’s boys played some sublime football with Mitchel Watterson, at just 16 years of age, sitting in the hole, pulling the strings and regularly finding Aaron Wightman or Seamus Duffy in the pockets between Cliftonville’s defensive lines, As well as this, Corai Quinn and Jonny Russell were stretching Cliftonville by constantly pushing up wide to support the play while Jordan Jenkins and Ben Cushnie led the line and pulled the Cliftonville defence apart.
The Wee Glens attacked wave after wave, caused Cliftonville absolute havoc and scored a further four goals, 2 for Ben Cushnie (82nd & 84th minutes) and a further two goals for Jenkins in the 80th and 89th minutes bringing his tally for the team to 14 goals in 9 appearances.
Final score: Glentoran Seconds 5 - 1 Cliftonville Olympic
Ben Cushnie
Glentoran Seconds: Kai Beck, Corai Quinn, Willie Garrett, Shay Burns, Jonathan Russell, Ben McCaul, Mitchel Watterson, Aaron Wightman, Matthew Smith, Jordan Jenkins (Captain), Ben Cushnie Subs: Tomas Matthews, Diarmud O'Hanlon, Seamus Duffy
The Wee Glens have been drawn against Linfield Swifts in the Quarter Final