Allianz National Football League Division Four North: Louth 3-8 Antrim 1-15
ALL-IRELAND winners Mickey Harte and Enda McGinley took their first dip into Division Four down in Haggardstown on Saturday afternoon and learned a thing or two about basement football.
Compounded by the desperately short run-in to this year’s NFL campaign, mistakes were plentiful, decision-making was often erratic and sometimes brilliant, the game was won and lost roughly a half-dozen times, there was effort, heart and by the end both sets of players were running on fumes.
Even as Ryan Murray went to strike the winner deep into stoppage-time for Antrim, cramp shot up his legs but there was just enough muscle memory in his trusted technique to see the ball crawl over Louth’s crossbar.
Sam Mulroy’s fantastic 65th minute goal put Louth two points ahead and they had ample opportunities to close the game out, but failed.
With the Antrim defence wilting, Mulroy raced clear a minute later seeking a hat-trick of majors, but O’Donovan Rossa ‘keeper Michael Byrne made a brave block to deny Louth’s best player.
Ciaran Byrne hacked another chance wide for the ‘Wee’ County and substitute John Clutterbuck inexplicably hesitated to pop the ball over the bar and another chance was spurned.
“We’d loads of great chances and that’s the frustrating thing for us,” said Harte, who was making his managerial bow with Louth after leaving Tyrone last November.
“Not only was the finish of the game [frustrating] but we got that excellent individual goal from Sam to go two up and we had very good chances to make it a four or five-point game.
“I think the unforced errors were off the radar. So, is that about the intensity of the opposition or is it ring rustiness? It’s probably a bit of both. It’s just a pity that those choices, those decisions made a wild difference at the end of the day.”
There were a couple of ways to interpret the quite dramatic finish to Saturday’s enjoyable encounter.
Louth kicked themselves out of it in the closing stages or Antrim showed the greater resilience and composure to grab a huge win that puts them in a great position for promotion out of the Division Four North round-robin group.
In by-gone days, Antrim probably would have headed home empty-handed from Haggardstown.
The morale-boosting upshot from Saturday was that Antrim managed to win a game from the jaws of defeat – a rare thing over the years for the Ulstermen – with three stoppage-time points from play.
Relieved Antrim manager Enda McGinley said afterwards: “Realistically, five minutes before the end you would have happily taken a draw and went up the road with a point. But, to be honest, we should have been further ahead, we missed a lot of chances.
“I said to the fellas, because of the limited time we had together and limited challenge games, everybody was going to be rough round the edges, the football is not going to be tidy, there are going to be plenty of mistakes and it’s about coping with those mistakes and just keeping in the game and showing composure at the critical moments, and to their credit they did that.
“They came through a period of time where they’d huge chances, they kept missing them… but most hearteningly for the squad and us as management the boys we put in off the bench had a huge say in that. That’s brilliant for them.”
Antrim’s bench was indeed decisive. Eoghan McCabe of St Gall’s had no intention of recycling the ball and instinctively fired over to put Antrim 1-12 to 2-7 ahead on 63 minutes – a lead that was quickly wiped after the hosts hit a quick-fire 1-1.
Paddy Cunningham’s trademark banana shot on 71 minutes would have had Roberto Carlos purring with admiration before fellow sub Eunan Walsh hauled the visitors level two minutes later.
And just when it seemed the game would finish in a diplomatic draw, Patrick McBride, another Antrim sub, popped the ball to Ryan Murray who cut in from the right to grab the winning score.
Seconds later, Antrim’s match-winner was sent off having accrued black and yellow cards.
Without the injured Mick McCann, young debutant Conor Stewart posted a brilliantly composed display in anchoring the Antrim midfield.
“I thought Conor Stewart was absolutely outstanding out there for a 19-year-old, an amazing performance,” beamed McGinley.
There were few attacking thrusts down the middle from Antrim as McGinley opted to cut Louth open down the flanks. And to a large degree it was a successful tactic.
Buccaneering wing-backs Dermot McAleese and Marc Jordan were glowing features of Antrim’s play in the opening period.
The unsung McAleese thumped to the net to give the visitors a 1-3 to 0-2 lead while Jordan sent over a fine score a few minutes earlier.
Wasteful with several first-half attacks, Mickey Harte’s men finally gained a foothold in the game when Mulroy converted a 25th minute penalty after Declan Lynch was adjudged to have fouled Declan Byrne, and two minutes later debutant Sean Marry raised another green flag after Mulroy’s aerial ability had exposed Antrim’s back-line.
Conor Murray’s second point of the day on the cusp of half-time reduced Louth’s lead to two points [2-5 to 1-6] but thanks to Ryan Murray’s four placed ball conversions in the second period the visitors found themselves two ahead before Louth rallied again.
Antrim corner-back Peter Healy had done reasonably well on Mulroy throughout Saturday’s duel but the Louth man’s brilliant movement for his second goal was uncontainable before Ryan Murray summoned the energy to hit the winner late on.
In the lead-up to the game, Louth trainer Gavin Devlin stressed the importance of doing well out of possession.
They tackled like tigers throughout Saturday's League opener - but it was in possession where Louth were found wanting on too many occasions.
With his inter-county managerial debut out of the way against his old mentor, Enda McGinley could finally breathe out.
Louth: Martin McEneaney; D Corcoran, D Campbell, D McKenny; L Jackson, A Williams (0-1), E Callaghan; B Duffy, C Byrne; A McDonnell (0-1), C Keenan (0-1), C Downey (0-1); S Marry (1-0), S Mulroy (2-2, 1-0 pen, 0-1 ’45), D Byrne (0-2) Subs: E Carolan for Corcoran (43), T Durnin for Marry (54), L Grey for Jackson (62), R Nally for D Byrne (62), J Clutterbuck for McKenny (66), E Duffy for B Duffy (73)
Yellow card: D McKenny (18), D Corcoran (41), E Carolan (48)
Antrim: M Byrne; J McAuley, D Lynch, P Healy; M Jordan (0-1), J Laverty, D McAleese (1-0); C Stewart, N McKeever; R Murray (0-6, 0-4 frees), A Loughran, R McCann (0-1, ’45); O Eastwood (0-2 frees), K Small, C Murray (0-2) Subs: P McBride for N McKeever (50), N Delargy for D Lynch (53 inj), E McCabe (0-1) for M Jordan (57), P Cunningham (0-1) for K Small (62), E Walsh (0-1) for D McAleese (72)
Black card: R Murray (28 -38)
Red card: R Murray (78, black and yellow)
Referee: B Tiernan (Dublin)
