Club Women: Malone through to AIL Playoff Final.

—

by

John McMurtry

We are currently carrying out a necessary behind-the-scenes upgrade to how images are stored and delivered on The Front Row Union Sports. With over 770,000 images on the site, we are moving our entire image library to a dedicated cloud storage service. This means images will load faster for you, regardless of where you are in the world, and the site will be more reliable overall.

As we are working on three separate versions of images during the offload process, the site cache sometimes struggles to keep up with which version to display and occasionally post grid images or complete galleries may fail to appear. This is a temporary side effect of the migration process — the image exists and is safe, it is simply in the process of being moved to its new home and identified as being there. A refresh of the page will usually bring them back, however, if it does not please contact john@thefrontrowunion.com stating clearly the post address and we will restore it as soon as possible. We apologise for any inconvenience this causes and appreciate your patience.

We expect the bulk of the image migration to be completed by the end of June 2026, with a fully upgraded version of the site ready to launch in August 2026. Once that work is done, the site will be noticeably faster, images will load more reliably, and you will not see any further disruption of this kind. Thank you for your continued support of The Front Row Union Sports.

Malone Women progressed to the AIL Playoff Final after a convincing win against Westport Women in Co. Mayo yesterday afternoon.

The game was played with a strong wind blowing down the pitch and Malone kicked off with the wind at their back. However the wind was too strong and uncontrollable to give any side a real advantage.

The visitors had to endure a nervy start as Westport set about the game with some conviction. The wind and both sides abrasive defense led to quite a few dropped balls in the first quarter with neither side managing to get an advantage in a tight game.

Peita McAllister heads for the line for the opening score. 

Malone eventually got their breakthrough on the half hour mark when crossed out wide after surges at the line by and drew in the home side’s defense.

Westport looked for an immediate response but the Malone defence held firm, standing out with a few turnovers and strong runs. The Belfast side made a decisive break towards the end of the first half which ended with Maginnes barging over close to the posts. converted to give the visitors a 0 – 12 lead at the break.

Lauren Maginnes celebrates her score against Westport.

Malone looked a much more settled side in the second half, playing into the strong wind. Their passes hit home much more frequently and they worked hard to keep possession. It was a simple tactic but they worked it well, battling their way upfield for the impressive McCord to stretch over for their third try, the rangy second row unfortunately picking up an injury in the process.

Naomi McCord reaches for the line for a decisive try.

Durkan had a stab at the conversion but had to watch it blow back over her shoulder after making it halfway to the posts.

The Belfast side continued to keep it simple and ten minutes later it was the influential Maginnes going over for her second score, this time off the back of a scrum, to give Malone a 22 – 0 lead.

The home side responded almost immediately with a much deserved try of their own, after turning over possession at the restart. With the successful conversion the score moved to 7 – 22.

However it was Malone who had the final say as centre battled through the midfield defence for the Red Sox fifth try.

Final score: Westport 7 Malone 27

BIG GALLERY BELOW

IF in Doubt, sit them out

Download the UK Concussion Guidelines for Grassroots Sport Here

Corrections

Drop us a note below if there are any corrections required in this article.

← Back

Thank you for your response. ✨

Rugby Latest