- Gareth O'Reilly
- Fri, Jun 12 2015
Cabinteely won their first game since March 27th as they overcame Athlone Town by two goals to nil thanks to goals from Shane O’Neill and Sodiq Oguntola. The win is Cabo’s third of the season and also their third at home while Alan Mathews side have now lost six games in total this season.
Cabinteely started much the better in this game as they brought the game to their fellow Leinster side. Cabo had former Athlone player Sodiq Oguntola amongst their ranks for this one whilst the dugouts saw Andrew Rice continue in charge of the League’s newest club while Alan Matthews was as animated as ever in the opposing dugout.
In fact Cabo were on top by such a margin they managed to hit the post twice in the opening ten minutes. First Oguntola connected with a snap shot on the edge of the Athlone box, followed by a headed effort from Kevin Knight.
However, the home fans did not have to wait much longer for their opening goal as on sixteen minutes Shane O’Neill popped up on the edge of the six yard box to poke home, with the former Bray Wanderers striker barely able to believe that the Town’s defence allowed the ball to get all the way through to him.
Athlone began to grow more and more into the game soon after as Garbhan Coughlan was amongst the men in blue and black to hit one just wide of Evan Whelan’s goal frame. Daniel Purdy then went even closer just five minutes later as his effort was only kept out by the face of Evan Whelan following the ball taking a vicious bounce just in front of the former Shamrock Rovers keeper.
Whelan was again called into action when Sam O’Connor forced the keeper to produce a fantastic fingertip save to direct his drive around the post. The home fans had quietened down at this point while the travelling Athlone support were beginning to sense a goal was not far away.
Cabinteely, who hadn’t really threatened too much since their goal, then went close from a set-piece as Shane O’Neill’s thirty yard effort went marginally over Dunican’s bar.
Athlone, who ended the first half the stronger of the two teams, continued to dominate at the start of the second period with Chindea passing up a glorious opportunity for a clean strike at goal just two minutes after the restart.
Moments later the game threatened to turn ugly as a late and dangerous looking challenge by Stephen Quigley on Cabo striker Sodiq Oguntola saw both teams exchange verbal’s before Michael Connolly brandished a yellow card to the original offender, Quigley.
With less than half an hour to play and Cabo parking the bus, the Cabo fans were beginning to become concerned about their teams’ chances of defending the wave of attacks that Athlone were throwing at them. Aidan Friel almost even getting lucky with a long range free kick that had to be tipped behind by the extremely busy Evan Whelan.
But football can be a funny game at times, as it was in fact Cabinteely that would score next and double their lead, although they were without doubt helped by some poor and lacklustre defending from the Midlanders.
New signing Oguntola was the man that got the goal as he sprinted through before flicking the ball beyond the last defender, the number nine then showed great maturity to slot the ball coolly under the onrushing Dunican.
It appeared like it just wasn’t going to be for Athlone as Chindea once again missed a guilt edge opportunity from just six yards out when the ball should have been coolly slid into the back of the net from just six yards out.
As the last ten minutes approached it was time to change from calling Athlone unlucky to just calling them wasteful with Friel once again failing to hit the target when venturing forward into the box. Even the introduction of Phillip Gorman couldn’t help Alan Matthews cause.
Even the six added minutes at the end of the game were not enough to help Athlone grab a point or indeed a consolation goal much to manager Mathews immense frustration.
Cabinteely: Evan Whelan, Daniel Cambell, Victor Ekanem, Kevin Knight, Jamie McGlynn; Aaron Brilly, Evan Finnegan, Stephen Hanley (Conor Foley 84), Shane O’Neill (Lloyd Cairns 59); Sodiq Oguntola (Ross Broderick 90+5), Gerald Pender.
Subs Not Used: Jamie Broderick, Gavin Fahey, Josh Quinlivan, Sean Hyland.
Yellow Cards: None.
Athlone Town: Paddy Dunican, Aidan Friel, Robert Gaul, Stephen Dunne, Derek Doyle; Stephen Quigley (Michael Brown 55), Marco Chindea (Daniel Molloy 86), Daniel Purdy, Gavin Boyne; Garbham Coughlan, Sam O’Connor (Phillip Gorman 78).
Subs Not Used: Colm Murray, Aidan Collins, Sean French, Thomas Mulroney.
Yellow Cards: Quigley (51).
Referee: Michael Connolly.
Attendance: 983.
Extratime.ie Man of the Match: Evan Whelan (Cabinteely).
