Congrats Dundalk

[Mr A]

Well done Dundalk.

Don't like your manager but well deserved league title.

[Stuttgart88]

A shame the first goal was controversial. Scrappy game but credit to both teams for a good season. Credit too to Kenny. Great comeback.

[Terry]

Congrats Dundalk, delighted for all the Galway boys playing up there.

[bennocelt]

Congrats Dundalk, best team won the league, and fingers crossed kenny can keep that team together for a good stint at next years CL:D

[Real ale Madrid]

Congratulations to Dundalk. Fully deserved and a class outfit.

Someone wake me Tuesday morning for work.

[geysir]

It turned out alright on the night. It didn't look great at half time but Dundalk managed to take effective control in the 2nd half.
Dundalk might have deserved the title over the season's play but all that had little to do on the night, they had to win it back from a persistent durable Cork team.

[PartySaint]

Congrats Dundalk, brilliant for most of the season bar a mini blip near the end. A fantastic style of football they play, very enjoyable team to watch as long as it's not stringing 39 passes together before going 4-1 up against your own team.

Enjoy the celebrations.

[BonnieShels]

Congrats and hon Dundalk. Absolutely delighted!

[outspoken]

Delighted for SK and of course Vinny Perth, can't wait to play in the top flight against teams like this next season. Enjoy the night lads

[strikeforce]

Congrats and hon Dundalk. Absolutely delighted!
Best team won no complaints and enjoy, pity about the scum ye had following ye tonight though.

[dong]

Not to pass any heed of trolls is important on days like this.
Well done to Dundalk. Fantastic club with a rich tradition, delighted for them.
Enjoy it lads. There is nothing like that feeling.

[BonnieShels]

Best team won no complaints and enjoy, pity about the scum ye had following ye tonight though.

As a Shels man, I'm used to the scum that follow us.


Not to pass any heed of trolls is important on days like this.
Well done to Dundalk. Fantastic club with a rich tradition, delighted for them.
Enjoy it lads. There is nothing like that feeling.

This!

Always a had a soft spot for them. Absolutely over the moon.

[ArdeeBhoy]

An Lu Abu...

[da bishop]

well done Dundalk ,played the best football all season and a credit to their manager who deserves huge respect for the job he has done especially after his previous venture.

[DannyInvincible]

Congrats to Dundalk and fair play to Kenny. There was a spell of pressure when they were misfiring and blasting everything over; I feared it wouldn't be their night, but well-deserved in the end, over the whole season.

[WoodquayBoy]

Congrats Dundalk, thoroughly deserved. Delighted for Hoban, Horgan but particularly O'Donnell - what a finish to the season for him considering that nightmare injury in April. Hope we get to welcome the champions in a league game in Eamonn Deacy Park next season. Enjoy the long weekend of celebrations

[Candystripe]

Congratulations Dundalk on a brilliant season.

I just wish I had of gone with my heart and did a correct score.
I've been in the exact same position as Cork fans tonight in '05.

Would be brilliant if we won the cup now.

Nothing against the Dubs like, but a season were every trophy is outside of the pale is a good season ;)

[CityRebel]

Congrats to Dundalk, they deserved to win the league this year. It's a pity a large number of their fans felt the need to come over at the end of the game goading and throwing bottles, golf balls, and various other missiles at City fans.

[Straightstory]

Yes - well done Dundalk!

[patrickccfc]

Well done Dundalk ye have been amazing this year and we can take great pride from the fact we stuck in there with ye right to the very end. The initial feeling was obviously disappointment but on the bus the feeling was more upbeat about how far we have come in the last 4 years from being on the brink of extinction to to where we are now. City til I die

[Dunny]

Fair play to ya Bonnie! Gent as always :)

Been around for two other leagues but too young to remember!! This was special though

Champions :)

[legendz]

Yes, congratulations Dundalk! Massive win when required. Enjoy the celebrations and like us in the Kingdom - winter well! ;)

[adamd164]

Fair play to Stephen Kenny for being gracious in victory and acknowledging our challenge this year. In the end the better side won, there's no question.

I feel we've done brilliantly this year from where we've come and expect us to push on next season, there should be increased money available for players with the European revenue we'll get, but I also expect the younger lads to have learned a lot from this year.

Edit: meant to put this in the match thread but congrats to Dundalk anyway.

[holidaysong]

I have been a foot.ie member for ten years waiting to see this thread. Beautiful. And fair play to Cork - fans were superb last night.

[The Donie Forde]

Well done to Dundalk.
Gutted our lads didn't perform to their best when it most mattered. Think the long-term injuries and thread-bare squad could only be carried so far, and we came up short in the end. Proud of our fans, proud of our club.
Can't argue when you lose three games to the champions, however!
Hope they represent the LoI well in the CL, we'll do our best in the EL.

[CrowdedHouse]

Well done Dundalk

[Martinho II]

massive congrats to Dundalk ex flatmate is a huge Dundalk fan whose brother is strongly involved with Supporters club so delighted for him! I havent being to Oriel since 08 so really lookin forward to returnin there! I am so happy for Stephen Kenny and especially Vinny Perth who was treated terribly by us in 08 when he was caretaker mgr. if I rem correctly VP as caretaker we beat Dundalk in Oriel!

on the bad side awful that their bandwagon support did what they did to Cork fans thats disgraceful carryon!

[Dunny]

massive congrats to Dundalk ex flatmate is a huge Dundalk fan whose brother is strongly involved with Supporters club so delighted for him! I havent being to Oriel since 08 so really lookin forward to returnin there! I am so happy for Stephen Kenny and especially Vinny Perth who was treated terribly by us in 08 when he was caretaker mgr. if I rem correctly VP as caretaker we beat Dundalk in Oriel!

on the bad side awful that their bandwagon support did what they did to Cork fans thats disgraceful carryon!

What happened ?

[cheifo]

Well done Dundalk well deserved - and an epic effort from Cork who seem to have found themselves a good manager and some very promising young players.

[eamoss]

on the bad side awful that their bandwagon support did what they did to Cork fans thats disgraceful carryon!


What happened ?

This..


It's a pity a large number of their fans felt the need to come over at the end of the game goading and throwing bottles, golf balls, and various other missiles at City fans.

I seen about 100+ guys form in front of the away supports while making foul gestures before being pushed away by security, really poor behaviour from our so called fans. I only seen this from the shed so didn't know they threw stuff as well.

[Pablo Escobar]

Congrats Dundalk, over the course of the season it was deserved.

On the topic of the scum, it's hard to get worked up about them. They're just an embarrassment.

[disgruntled]

Congratulations to Dundalk.
Worthy Champions.
Best team in the League by far but we ran them close.

What happened at the end was unfortunate.
Could have been a lot worse with no thanks to the Gardai & security who seemed asleep to it all.
Only for the City fans being so restrained there could have been a serious incident which would have spoiled such a great occasion.

[Macy]

On the topic of the scum, it's hard to get worked up about them. They're just an embarrassment.
Well it was a brutal advertisement for Dundalk to see a sizeable number ignoring the team and going to the away fans.

Just for some balance, it was good to see a few of the home fans commiserate with cork players on their way to the celebrations too though.

[jinxy lilywhite]

CHAMP10NS

Great game from start to finish. Actually I lost my voice. If anyone finds it please send me a PM.

Kudos to travelling CCFC fans,. your a delight and credit to your city and your club.

[Guinney]

Congrats to Dundalk, they deserved to win the league this year. It's a pity a large number of their fans felt the need to come over at the end of the game goading and throwing bottles, golf balls, and various other missiles at City fans.

Absolute morons and they are an embarrassment to the club and the town. I hope no one got hit by one of these objects. I just don't understand the mentality of being bad winners like this and just not celebrating in a normal way. No need to behave like this. Unfortunately most clubs in this league have a few eejits following them and give the rest of us who follow the league a bad name.

I lived in Cork for a year and it's a great city, so it's great to see the club on the up again this year. Caulfield has work wonders.

[Sean South]

Don't think I could take all the self congratulating if Cork won it. So well done Dundalk.

[oriel]

Congratulations to Dundalk.
Worthy Champions.
Best team in the League by far but we ran them close.

What happened at the end was unfortunate.
Could have been a lot worse with no thanks to the Gardai & security who seemed asleep to it all.
Only for the City fans being so restrained there could have been a serious incident which would have spoiled such a great occasion.

I'm very sorry to hear about how a small section of our fans behaved in front of the away support. This was totally unacceptable and goes against all sporting fair play. It's also very disappointing to hear as myself and my friends made it our business to be welcome and friendly to loads of city fans pre match.

[oriel]

Well done to Dundalk.
Gutted our lads didn't perform to their best when it most mattered. Think the long-term injuries and thread-bare squad could only be carried so far, and we came up short in the end. Proud of our fans, proud of our club.
Can't argue when you lose three games to the champions, however!
Hope they represent the LoI well in the CL, we'll do our best in the EL.

I have it say I was really worried after Bray, thought we lost a little momentum, but the big players stood up last night, Towell, O'Donnell and Hoban in particular put in great shifts. The feeling when the second goal went in was just magic, no other word, amazing night and it really means everything. I had a chat with an old school teacher who is in Germany 15 years, and a good guy who was a former programme editor in the early 80's, moved away due to recession 28 years ago, these are the guys you feel so happy for.

Thanks Donnie, you boys just fell short, but you can take great encouragement from an excellent campaign. We never thought you would win those last 6 games, but you did. However losing 3 times v Dundalk was crucial. I enjoyed meeting a lot of city fans pre match, lovely fans, but almost all I asked were not too confident pre match. Hope you all enjoyed your visit. Kennedy's pre match was like a city fan club!

[patrickccfc]

Kennedy's pre match was like a city fan club!

Shame a lot of us didn't get to experience the pre match build up as we were left waiting around 45 minutes outside Dundalk for a garda escort to the ground. Didn't get into the ground until around 15mins before kick off which was a shame

[White Horse]

Good article by Eamonn Sweeney in the Indo today.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/league-of-ireland/champions-with-true-class-30693464.html

[oriel]

Looking back on all of our games, I was thinking which ones caused us most problems last season.

The two away games to both Bray & Drogs netted a total of 2 points from 12, however I still think the hardest games we had were as follows:

1/ Rovers H 2-2 ,we were battered in the first half, although Rovers only scored in 93rd min, it was still a very hard point.

2/ Pats H 0-0, very tough game with little chances either side, also Hoban was out for 3 weeks and McMillan got a red card, possibly first half.

3/ Pats A 0-1, possibly should have got a draw, but Pats definitely won it on tactics this night.

4/ Rovers H 0-0, this was the game in hand and was probably the toughest one of the lot.

It may seem a surprise not to include any of the Cork games, but we won each of these and with an agg of 8-1, and it was these 9 points that won us the league really.

[White Horse]

The first away game to Athlone was also really tough. We created very little and were fortunate to get a late penalty. The second home game against Bohs was also tough, two wonder strikes from them left us chasing the game.

[El-Pietro]

2014 = 1998/99. Three defeats to our closest rivals cost us the title, just one positive result would have done it for us. I called it mid season in one of our fanzines.

[oriel]

The first away game to Athlone was also really tough. We created very little and were fortunate to get a late penalty. The second home game against Bohs was also tough, two wonder strikes from them left us chasing the game.

I think we just played rubbish away to Athlone (and stole the win in the 92nd min) but I forgot about the second Bohs game, they were crusing at 2-1 at one stage, and it wasn't even HT.

EL P as tough as it was, not losing again after we beat you in August until the last game, the fact that it was Dundalk killed you. Still a very good season though, runners up and back in Europe.

[El-Pietro]

No doubt about that. Still glad we took it to the last day.

[jinxy lilywhite]

One week later and it's still marvelous being champions

:cool:

[disgruntled]

One week later and it's still marvelous being champions

:cool:

Good for you but now comes the hard bit, trying to hold on to it.
Next season should be very close with other teams strengthening.

[Dunny]

Good for you but now comes the hard bit, trying to hold on to it.
Next season should be very close with other teams strengthening.
Ahh, We'll probably strengthen ourselves ;)

For unbridled passionate local radio coverage of LOI and DundalkFC matches look no further than DundalkFM radio commentators Ger Cunningham and John Murphy and watch and listen to this clip from last week.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1021269677889846&set=vb.209550289061793&type=3&theater

[jinxy lilywhite]

Good for you but now comes the hard bit, trying to hold on to it.
Next season should be very close with other teams strengthening.

I agree but I will leave the worrying about that to King Kenny. 5 lads are signed up already for next season. Hopefully next will be skip, Horgan, Hoban and Gannon. We do need to strengthen but who and in what positions I am not sure. Probably replacements for Rossi, Higgo and another striker.
It's nice that Cardiff are keeping Towell ticking over in the of season lol. He was a special special player and irreplaceable IMO. Kenny has one year left and I would break the bank to keep him here.

Throughout our illustrious history of winning either a league or an fai cup in every decade since the 30's that no other club had done makes us the best club ever :p, Dundalk have never actually successfully retained a league which I found fascinating. I am sure the king knows this and wants this team to be the first.

Key games for me was the defeats we suffered. Actually I mean our reaction to them. Defeat to drog we went unbeaten until Bray. The Bray defeat we went 19 games but it was out manner of performance against Cork home and away, the ruthless antihalation of a poor Drogheda, beating sligo twice league and fai cup, picking up max points over our European games. Losing to Pats was tough and I think every Dundalk knew it was going to the last day.
Such a terrific session. It could of been much more. What if that mad 10 mins never of happened against rovers in the cup or if the weather was a little bit better in the Setanta who knows ha ha.

A strong Cork, Derry, Sligo and Dundalk can only be good for the league.

[White Horse]

Dundalk voted Team Of The Year in the RTE sports awards.

The League Of Ireland featured prominently in the programme and twitter went into melt down with disgust at a LOI team winning the accolade.

Not bad for a league that is either a difficult child or doesn't even exist.

Now to pay that mobile phone bill.