St. Patrick's Athletic (Friendly)

Another encouraging effort from the Youths tonight, this time largely of a defensive nature, as it took a soft enough peno, ten minutes from time, to separate the two teams in Ferrycarrig tonight. Youths are apparently carrying a lot of injuries at present and went with Graham Doyle, Craig McCabe, Lee Grace, Ryan Delaney, Craig Comerford, Conor Whittle, Peter Higgins, Craig Wall, Eric Molloy and with Conor English supporting Danny Furlong up front. Pats dominated the first period in terms of possession and control of the ball, but both sides had two decent chances to score. Youths could have scored with their first attack after two minutes when a good cross by Craig Comerford found Danny in the Pats box, but O'Malley managed to keep out his first-time effort. With 20 minutes gone, a Youths defender managed a block on the line to prevent Pats from scoring. Midway through the half, Danny turned inside Kenny Browne to create a goal-scoring chance, but shot a yard wide. With 20 minutes to go, Graham Doyle pulled off a fantastic one-handed save to keep out a point-blank header from Kenny Browne and then 10 minutes later got down to stop Forrestal from scoring on the rebound. 0-0 at half time with Youths largely funnelling back and then trying to release Danny reasonably quickly to exploit the space between the Pats central defenders and goalkeeper.

Second half saw Fagan, Conan Byrne and Sean Hoare coming on for Pats with the Youths not making a change and wasn't as good as the first half. On the hour mark, Conor English had an effort from an angle which went a yard past the post. Danny Furlong was then replaced by Andy Wall and Youth's forward threat greatly reduced. Paul Brennan then came on for Craig Comerford for the Youths. Lots of Pats pressure from then on but little of note created until, with ten minutes to go, a Youths defender seemed to win the ball in the tackle inside the Wexford area but the referee thought otherwise to enable Killian Brennan to slot home past Graham for 1-0. Quiet enough ending from then on with Seamus Houghton coming on for Graham Doyle and late cameo appearances by Conor Maher and David Doyle. Best for Wexford were Danny who looked very lively up front and Peter Higgins and Craig Wall in midfield while Ryan Delaney and Lee Grace did nothing wrong in the middle of the back four. For Pats, Greg Bolger ran the show and found two full-backs - Birmingham and McCormack - ready to go forward at every opportunity to give the necessary width.
1-0 to Pats at full-time.

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Originally Posted by ForzaForth

Youths are apparently carrying a lot of injuries at present and went with Graham Doyle, Craig McCabe, Lee Grace, Ryan Delaney, Craig Comerford, Conor Whittle, Peter Higgins, Craig Wall, Eric Molloy and with Conor English supporting Danny Furlong up front. .

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Who is injured at the moment or would normally be starting games if available?

DrDoc

Both starting centre-halves from last year - Stephen Last and Gary Delaney - haven't appeared yet this year. Also missing Jimmy Dermody at left full. On the wings, Deano Broaders, Andy Mulligan and new signing Drukie Drohan from Waterford haven't played yet. Rocks Keenan got a knock in the Bohs friendly and wasn't risked last night. The word is that Gary and Deano are the most seriously affected.

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Originally Posted by ForzaForth

DrDoc

Both starting centre-halves from last year - Stephen Last and Gary Delaney - haven't appeared yet this year. Also missing Jimmy Dermody at left full. On the wings, Deano Broaders, Andy Mulligan and new signing Drukie Drohan from Waterford haven't played yet. Rocks Keenan got a knock in the Bohs friendly and wasn't risked last night. The word is that Gary and Deano are the most seriously affected.

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Thanks Forza, I had Last, Delaney and Broaders in mind but could not place the other regulars from last season and was on phone so too lazy to look up ;)

What has English looked like so far, saw him once for Evergreen recently and in fairness he looked decent enough

Very encouraging start from Conor English so far. Played left wing and up front against Bohs and looked very good. Particularly impressed that he seemed to be physically ready for dealing with Premier-level defenders on the Bohs team. Played in a more withdrawn role behind Danny Furlong against Pats and wasn't as prominent but that's to be expected as, based on the two matches, Pats would be a step ahead of Bohs at the moment. Seems to be a good dead-ball specialist which has been a weak point of ours in recent times.