Wexford Youths 5 - 2 Salthill Devon
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Sixteen minutes gone and Youths, two goals in arrears, already have a hand on the Airtricity League’s wooden spoon. I can’t get a pre-match image of Packie Holden out of my mind. Mud spattered and sweat stained I glimpsed the Wexford keeper sitting disconsolately on the floor outside the home dressing room door whilst the pre-match pep talk was going on within.
No one could accuse Holden of lack of commitment to his club over the seasons, both on and off the pitch but, after conducting the goalkeeping warm up, he can take no further part in the night’s drama. He is suspended following his explosive altercation with the referee in the dying seconds of the game against Waterford. His deputy is a kid still eligible for the youth team. I wonder how Holden feels now about the self inflicted damage he has done to the vital final team sheet of the season.
Salthill have gone ahead in the eighth minute, striker-skipper James Whelan bursting into the penalty area trailing defenders. Sean Allen’s advance is tentative and Whelan pokes it under him into the net. His second goal, eight minutes later, owes more to chance when Gaffney’s well flighted free kick from the right seems to deflect off the number nine past the young keeper.
The man at the other end is a deputy too, Adrian Faherty. He moves swiftly to turn a drive from Elmes over but, a minute later, commits the mistake on which the game will turn. Dempsey’s corner from the left is waist high and too near the keeper but as Faherty stoops to collect it he only succeeds in diverting it into his own goal. Dempsey is involved in the equaliser too. His long crossfield free kick arrows to Nolan on the right and he puts Darragh Walshe in to score the best goal of the evening. Just before halt time is the ideal time to score and suddenly Youths are back in contention.
The interval sees one of the floodlight pylons fail, sparking banter that Mick Wallace is cutting the club’s ESB bill. And sure enough, the miscreant bank of lighting is restored for the re-start.
When Salthill last visited Ferrycarrig in May they won comfortably. Six of that squad are present for the grand finale but as the second half progresses it is clear that the revitalised Youths side have seized the day. Patsy Malone, right knee strapped, is fit to stiffen the midfield. Dempsey, who has been out of sorts since his return from Waterford, has an influential match and Darragh Walshe, who has survived a difficult enough rites of passage season with distinction, has more to offer than the visiting central defenders can cope with. They are slow to close down and often caught too square; all in all there is a diffidence about Salthill now that Youths find possible to exploit. Elmes puts them ahead in the 57th minute with a powerful long range header from Broaders corner. Then it’s Malone’s turn, heading home another Broaders cross twelve minutes later.
It could have been worse for the visitors. Just after the restart Dempsey, wrong footed by the flight of the ball in front of an open goal, could only volley it over with a double footed leap. On sixty three minutes, Elmes, having shrugged off his marker and lobbed the ball over a marooned keeper, ran on towards an open goal only to propel the ball against a post.
At the other end Allen flaps at shot but makes a good close range block from the rebound and he goes full length to hold Porter’s low but less than venomous drive.
But the home side are in cruise control and the final goal was a deserved reward for Dean Broaders as he filleted the Salthill right flank yet again and made no mistake just two minutes short of the ninety. After the match the alarm went off in the Wexford Youths clubhouse but Packie Holden was still smiling. Alls well that ends well. Youths escape the wooden spoon and Devon will not have to play off to preserve their senior status. Assuming, that is, they have a senior League in which to compete next season. The League is being very coy, presumably waiting for the financial dust to settle to see how many clubs they have left before announcing the shape of things to come.
But it’s a brave new world surely. Now that Michael D. is President of the Republic as well as Galway United maybe he can do something to restore the football club’s fortunes. One hundred and fifteen goals conceded this season is hardly promising but the bottom club in the Estonian League, Lasnamae FC Ajax have let in over a hundred a fifty and lost 11-2 the other week in front of 82 customers in a 9,000 capacity stadium. If you really want to feel sorry for goalkeepers Maksim Mamutov is the name to remember in your prayers.
Wexford Youths: Sean Allen; Mark Phelan, Karl Keogh, Martin Kehoe, James Darmody; Shane Nolan, Shane Dempsey (Eoin Kinsella 70), Patsy Malone, Dean Broaders; Tom Elmes (Dave Grincell 88) , Darragh Walshe (Muzzi Mullen 90+1).
Salthill Devon: Adrian Faherty; Colm Horgan, Paddy Quinlan, Cian Fadden, Phil Donnelly (Timmy Molloy h/t); Robert Porter, Eugene Greaney, Brian Geraghty, Brian Gaffney; James Whelan, Paul Smyth (Charlie Burke 66).
Referee: Darren Coombes
Attendance (Est) 85
