England fell to an agonising 10-7 defeat to Ireland in the 2024 ELF Men’s U20 Championship final in Wroclaw, Poland on Saturday.
Josh Clegg scored a hat-trick of goals as England looked to retain the trophy they first won in 2019 but were unable to do enough on the day to claim the win and a slower third quarter left the young lions with too much to do.
In a game that started tentatively, Ireland eventually gained a two-goal lead through Christopher Burnetta and Emmet McDermott.
This setback seemed to kickstart England and, within five minutes of Ireland’s second goal, they found themselves ahead at 3-2 after goals from Hugo Peel, George Shonfeld, and Clegg.
Before the first quarter was done, however, Ireland were able to level up the scores just six seconds before quarter-time as Darcy Rybinski fired home his team’s third.
A fast start to the second quarter saw Ireland pull three goals ahead with Rybinski scoring his second and third either side of a McDermott strike to put the team in green 6-3 up.
England weren’t out for the count yet and fought back to within one goal after Finn Avis and Josh Phillips hit a goal each in just over a minute at the end of the second quarter.
As the third quarter started, it was clear that Ireland’s plan was to manage the game and protect their lead and a goal-less first seven and a half minutes proved this.
This game-plan served to tire England and Ireland managed to hit their seventh and eighth goals of the game through Burnetta and John Staunton to see them go into the final 15 minutes with a three goal cushion.
Two more goals for Ireland within the first five minutes of the final quarter from Rybinski and Sean Horkan probably put the game beyond England.
But the young lions refused to give up heading into the last seven minutes of the match and two more goals from Clegg put England within three of Ireland.
It proved to be slightly too late for England to stage an incredible comeback and the game finished 10-7 to Ireland who claim their first ELF Men’s U20 Championship title and England return home in second place.
England scorers: Josh Clegg (3G, 1A), Josh Phillips (1G, 1A), Finn Avis (1G), Hugo Peel (1G), George Shonfeld (1G).