Have to say Bohs were good in the first half and it was all Drogheda in the second half. Last minute mistake by the Drogs keeper made it look good. BUT, a win is a win
Important win for Harps in Wexford,were second best in the first half but played alot better in the second,there's 2 teams miles better than the rest and third is where we should be aiming......
Irish by birth ,Harps by the grace of god.
Have to say Bohs were good in the first half and it was all Drogheda in the second half. Last minute mistake by the Drogs keeper made it look good. BUT, a win is a win
Disappointing result but I've no real complaints. Rovers second goal is a stunner from Clarke.
Shout out to Colm Whelan, scoring four minutes after coming on for his Derry debut in what was his first match since doing his cruciate last summer
Delighted for him. Hopefully will give Kerrigan at Como a boost ahead of the new season too
Rovers managed to survive the freshly cut grass and control the game tonight. It was handy enough although Pat's did have one spell where they could have gotten a goal back and changed the momentum. They seem a bit toothless up front and overly reliant on Forrester.
Johnny Kenny put himself about and scored but also missed two sitters. He needs to be more clinical. If he was he'd be the leagues top scorer.
21 leagues and 25 cups.
Game in Tolka was entertaining. Shels were effective at soaking up pressure and we lacked an attacking edge. They got the break with the peno - not sure if there was contact but it was clumsy regardless. Some nice football played, stats like 8 corners to 0 kinda sums up the game. Not the important stat of course. Didnt see the Shels red card but Shels dug in and defended really well.
Thought we actually started quite well, but once the first goal went in we were second best. Lots of calls around me for offside on the first goal, but couldn’t tell from where I was. We were toothless up front as you say. Mulreany started quite brightly, but faded out of it. Think Rovers will win the league again. Two teenagers for us, Adam Murphy and Sam Curtis were both excellent I thought.
Out for a spell, got neglected, lay on the bench unselected.
Rovers definitely the better team in Inchicore tonight. I think the 4-3-3 suits pats well in most games but the 5–3-2 that they played in Tallaght definitely suits best when playing against rovers but only having 2 fit backup centre backs available at the club, the 4-3-3 had to be used and it left Eoin Doyle very isolated up top and creating chances was a struggle, in contrast to Tallaght where a good number were created. For all rovers dominance in possession it could’ve been 1-1 at half time with Forrester heading half a years wide from a corner. Second half also Lennon had a good effort that went just wide and the rovers go up the other end straight away and scored a cracker from Clarke to be fair. At 2-0 Lyness pulled off an absolutely incredible double save, looking forward to seeing it back
Paaatrick's Agletic
Can't complain too much about the game earlier. We put it up to Rovers well at times but ultimately they have greater quality, which especially tells when our best centre backs are out injured. Had a couple of moments of momentum that needed to be capitalised on to get something from the game which didn't happen, whereas Kenny and Clarke put their half chances away phenomenally well (and Lyness bailed us out on the ones Rovers would have expected to score).
Still being 4th now after the start we have is probably a bit of a win all in all.
Decent game in Tolka considering Shels were down to 10 early. Some shocking calls by the ref, no arguements with Farrell's red card but no yellow for Ward for the blatant push which Farrell reacted to. Shels also having what looked a perfectly good goal disallowed due to the Dundalk keeper clutching his face for no reason. Think Dundalk can feel hard done by for the Shels peno too. Looked harsh. Throw in the usual baffling calls it was another night to forget for the officials.
Treaty full value for a point and could have very well won the game.
Just on the Wexford I wonder is James Keddy under pressure,seems to have been a big investment down there in the pre season and you wouldn’t know it……
Starting Ethan Boyle in midfield tonight with Conor Levingston on the bench was bizarre,we wouldn’t exactly have a midfield you’d need to counteract with a tough tackling midfielder!
Irish by birth ,Harps by the grace of god.
Rovers certainly look like they are building up a head of steam, momentum is so important, so I can see Bohs and Derry being reeled in sooner than later. The 6 or so point lead Bohs have can e turned around in just the Dublin Derby if other clubs clubs are stingy on coughing up points. I still think Derry will be champions but that belief has being eroded slightly, they seem sloppy at at times which is not to do with player quality, they just need to be switched on. imo they have a team comparable to Rovers, but Derry are still naive or something, but they badly need to hit their groove. Most clubs should beat Cork at the moment including Dundalk *cough* so in terms of confidence boost, Im not sure its a major win. St Pat and Rovers next weekend could predicate on favourites etc
In attempting not to be biased I took the 'seen them given' stance on the peno but it was very soft, attacking player went over like his ankles were clipped, but no contact that i could see - defender should have had more sense as that peno was bought and then sold to the ref, maybe seeing it again from a different angle could change my opinion. Once again Dundalk put some nice phases together but just couldnt get to a second ball or get the ball to an attacking player, big high loopy crosses to a far post are just annoying as they rarely work and is wasteful. Other than that there wasnt a whole lot wrong with the performance - we miss Hoban, I dont think Martin is at the level needed to deputise yet, though with a run of games as he is currently getting will help, he has hardly seized his oppertunity mind!
That's two weeks in a row now that there's been cracking games and atmospheres live on RTE2 at venues full or nearly full, There's definitely a feeling that the standard and package are taking good strides forward this season so far. Dundalk will improve once Hoooban gets fit again and they can continue to get the best out of Tulloch. Despite the soft penalty, Shels were full value for their point, and had the bravery to go for and nearly catch Dundalk out on counters, down to 10 men on a few occasions.
I think when you go in with a high foot on the keeper and kick the ball almost out of his hand, it's always going to be a free out in fairness.
Not to say Sheppard wasn't faking getting caught in the face - he clearly wasn't but he saw a chance to get away with fumbling the original shot in the first place. Should have been an easy tip over the bar
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