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Some more pictures of Longford Town’s 1-0 win over Drogheda United last Friday at City Calling Stadium. All pictures by Jim Keogh from keoghimages.com
We had a vital 1-0 victory over Drogheda last Friday night at the City Calling Stadium. The visitors had a small travelling support and indeed many of our own supporters missed this important win because of the Spain v Portugal World Cup game live on TV. But even though there was small crowd than usual, it was no less noisy and supportive. Our goal came, somewhat against the run of play with Sam Verdon rising highest to head home the only goal of the game. His victory dance is now becoming very popular with our young supporters and was even used during the half time children’s game.
After that opening goal, a certain bite entered the game and at times, the ref struggled to keep tabs on proceedings. The visitors did have the ball in de Town net at the end but hearts started beating again when it was noticed that the linesman had it flagged offside.
It was the prefect response to the blip in Cabinteely and leaves sitting pretty enough in 4th place heading into the break. As one happy supporter put it as he unlocked his car… “we’ve won all our Friday home fixtures this season !” Maybe we should switch from Saturday nights!
We won’t have a home game now till July. Our next fixture will be away to league leaders UCD, where hopefully we can teach the students a lesson. In the meantime, there’s any amount of games on television to help fill the void. But really, there can’t be any substitute for the real live spectacle.
Once again, it was heartening to see so many youngsters enjoying Friday night’s game. Seeing the young boys and girls exchange high fives after the game and you know the game will survive locally long after these golden oldies have left the pitch of play. Enjoy the break from play and the talk and gossip about the potential new signings.
It’s bad enough being stuck in hospital for a long period during the warm summer days . But for Martin Stapleton, it’s even worse. Marty is going through a tough time in Mullingar hospital. First of all he has missed our terrific wins against Galway, Finn Harps and Drogheda. That’s bad enough but he has no facilities to watch the World Cup games on TV which is a real pain for one of the Town’s all time great supporters of the beautiful game. But apart from missing so many games, we really wish Marty a speedy recovery to full health. His main concern as he lay in his hospital bed during the week was how long more he’d be away from the club he loves so dearly. Get well first Marty, there’s plenty of games left yet.
Sincere congratulations to Town players, Shane Elworthy and Jamie Hollywood who played for the Irish Universities and Colleges against their French counterparts last Tuesday. Further congrats to Shane who was awarded player of the game. Ireland won 2-1 and thoroughly deserved their win against a talented French side. According to all accounts, the international organisers were very impressed with our facilities at the City Calling Stadium. We too were impressed with both teams who left the dressing rooms and bench area in a perfect condition. It now looks like we could be rewarded next season with further and more important international fixtures.
Work continues indoors on the revamped scoreboard. Not alone should it be able to tell us the score and time but it’ll also be able to flash messages for birthdays and lights left on in cars etc. The new scoreboard is being funded by the Supporters’ Club.
The above is the title of the latest book on our domestic league by author Brian Kennedy. It’s a superb collection of stories on the highs and lows of every single club in the land and some which are no longer with us. The book also contains a fine collection of excellent photos. Longford Town’s fabulous season of 2014 is very well remembered in an article by Martin Stapleton. It’d make a perfect late Father’s Day present or indeed just buy it for yourself. Copies are available in Newsround, Ballymahon St.
Our media manager James Donnelly is working overtime these days and nights. He’s the proud Daddy of his first born and is busy on nappy changing and bottle filling duties. But James still managed to upload the video to our social media various platforms of Sam Verdon’s vital winning goal on Friday night.
Despite promises of no notes last week, we simply had to acknowledge our win over Drogheda and a few other items. But that’s it for a few weeks. For any updates, keep an eye on our social media outlets. Until then, enjoy the fare from Russia.
Longford Town bounced back from their away defeat at Cabinteely with an excellent one-nil victory at home to promotion challengers Drogheda United to move back into the play-off places, as Sam Verdon’s sixth league goal of the season sealed the crucial three points for Neale Fenn’s charges at the City Calling Stadium last night.
The Town were missing the suspended Meenan and Galvin, and the injured Hopkins and Byrne, but Dervin was back in the panel after having completed his Leaving Cert. Drogheda were missing Conor Kane after he was injured at the City Calling Stadium on Tuesday during the Irish Colleges and Universities 2-1 victory over their French counterparts.
Drogheda were by far the superior team in the opening twenty-five minutes but failed to convert their dominance into goals.
In the eleventh minute, Drogheda striker Lyons should have scored but he fired his swivel shot straight at Town stopper Kelly from no more than eight yards out.
Two minutes later, Jake Hyland came very close to opening the scoring for the visitors but Kelly was alert to palm Hyland’s twenty yard curling strike around the post. Kelly was again called into action from the subsequent corner when he produced a fine save from Doyle’s header.
The home side had another lucky escape in the twenty-first minute when Purdy’s crisp twenty yard shot with the outside of his left boot from a Hyland cut-back came crashing back off the Longford post.
However, against the run of play, Longford hit the front on twenty-seven minutes when the towering Verdon rose above his markers to brilliantly head home from a McGlade free-kick.
Once the Town scored, they grew in confidence and proceeded to play much better for the rest of the contest. A superb weaving run into the visitors box from McGlade had the Drogheda defence in turmoil and his clever pull-back picked out Verdon, but his goalbound shot was magnificently blocked by defender Farragher.
Drogheda came close to equalising on 31 minutes when they struck the post for the second time as Mark Doyle’s 15 yard shot was pushed onto the post by Town keeper Kelly.
The second-half produced very few chances for either side, but the Town played the better football. Drogheda’s best opportunity came early in the new half as a Lyon’s volley from a Deacy cross rocketed narrowly over the Town bar, while at the other end, the Town should have scored a second goal on eigthty-five minutes, however, Mulhall’s shot from Hollywood’s excellent pass was straight at Drogheda keeper Skinner.
There were some excellent individual displays from Elworthy, McDonnell and McGlade but one player who deserves special mention is Karl Chambers. Just like Dervin, and Noack-Hoffman, Chambers has graduated from the underage ranks into the first team and his superb all round display last night proved what a valuable asset he is to the ‘Red & Black’s’ promotion push.
The Town have now won their last three matches against fellow top six sides with victories over Galway United, Finn Harps, and Drogheda to build momentum going into the summer break. Hopefully, they can make it four in-a-row against leaders UCD at the Belfield Bowl in their next fixture on Friday, June 29th.
Longford Town: Kelly, Elworthy, McDonnell, O’Reilly, Hofmann, Zambra, Chambers, Hollywood, Dervin, McGlade, Verdon.
Substitutes: Mulhall for Verdon (81 minutes).
Drogheda United: Skinner, Deacy, Gallagher, Farragher, Kelly, McCaffrey, Doyle, Hyland, Purdy, Brennan, Lyons.
Substitutes: Hondermarck for Purdy (63 minutes), Duffy for McCaffrey (78 minutes).
Match highlights and post match interviews are all on our Longford Town TV YouTube channel.
Pre-match pics….it’s always encouraging to see so many young faces enjoying real, live action.
Some action pics from our 1-0 win against Drogheda United that puts us into the play-off places before the mid-season break.
