Longford Town 0 - 1 Wexford Youths

• Deniese O'Flaherty
• Wed, May 05 2010


A mistake by Longford keeper Stephen Conlon in the 6th minute proved costly as the home side fell to their sixth defeat of the season at home to Wexford Youths on Tuesday night.

Under pressure from Gary Sheehan, Conlon’s poorly fisted clearance from Patsy Malone’s cross fell to Kevin Rowe. The Longford netminder came charging out and upended Rowe in the box. Up stepped Sheehan who made no mistake with the resultant penalty.

It was a disappointing display from the Town who failed to build on their excellent victory over Waterford United at the weekend. They went from their best performance of the season to arguably their worst.

Compared to Saturday night they were devoid of ideas, didn’t look comfortable on the ball and couldn’t string decent passes together. Although they had the lion’s share of possession they didn’t make their dominance count.

In a first half that they bossed, Longford failed to create too many goalscoring opportunities. Dave Freeman should’ve done better with his effort in the 8th minute while John Lester’s header from Ryan McEvoy’s corner just went over in the 12th minute.

After taking an early lead the Youths were happy to soak up the pressure and let the their opponents come at them. Their only other chance of the first half came in the 15th minute with David Breen blazing over from 20 yards out.

The next chance of the game didn’t arrive until just before the break but Lester’s free, after Hynes was fouled, was superbly tipped over by Youths keeper Pakie Holden. The first save the keeper had to make in the first half.

Another rush of blood from Conlon in the 61st minute nearly led to the visitors doubling their advantage. The keeper came rushing out of goals to clear but the ball fell to Danny Furlong, luckily for Conlon his blushes were spared by defender Niall O’Reilly who had tracked back and cleared the danger off the line.

Longford then took complete control of proceedings and pressed hard for an equaliser. McEvoy’s low drive was deflected out for a corner in the 73rd minute. Lester’s corner from the right met the head of Peter Hynes at the far post but his effort hit the side netting.

Ten minutes from time Mark Salmon had a great chance to get the Town back on level terms but his looping header just went wide. Right at the end Lester’s free from just outside the box was pushed out for a corner by Holden.

Longford Town: Conlon, O’Reilly, Byrne, Kelly (Hyland 66), K Cronin, McArdle (Glynn ht), Lester, Salmon, McEvoy (G Cronin 74), Hynes, Freeman.
Subs not used: Deans, Shanahan GK

Wexford Youths: Holden, Wolfe, Russell, Breen, Broaders, Byrne (Kehoe 90), Malone, Keohane, Rowe (Mullen 86), Sheehan, D Furlong.
Subs not used: McCann, Aust, Doyle GK.

Referee: J Grimes (Dublin)
Attendance: 140
Extratime man of the match: Anto Russell (Wexford Youths)