Ets his birthday wish

six-yard area, just beyond both Sean Thornton and Marc Griffin.

However, Drogheda were lucky not to be penalised for a lapse in concentration when they weren’t alert to a short corner by the visitors and Mark Slater’s subsequent cross picked out Kevin Knight who somehow failed to divert the ball past Stephen McGuinness from four yards out.

Drogs left-back Stephen Dunne did just enough to close down Slater and force him into a wayward shot, but another good move by Cabinteely ended with Shane Boyle dragging a 20-yard shot effort across goal.

In response, Drogheda forced a corner from which Hyland was well wide as he attempted a diving header from Brennan’s kick, but then a similar set-piece delivery at the other end was scrambled away unconvincingly by the home defence.

The Drogs finally registered a shot on target in the 38th minute when Kelly parried a Luke Gallagher header, and from the resulting corner it was Gallagher who saw his snap shot inadvertently blocked by teammate Thornton in the six-yard area.

That good spell continued when Brennan’s pass released Griffin who dinked the ball over the bar as he attempted to chip Kelly from 20 yards.

But Drogheda’s momentum was checked by the half-time whistle and when play resumed they had reverted to their slow, ponderous build-up approach, a tactic which Cabinteely were easily able to deal with.

Indeed, when the next goal attempt came - on the hour mark - it came from the visitors as Ben Hanrahan struck a disappointing free kick attempt straight into the arms of McGuinness.

So the breakthrough moment in the 66th minute was as unexpected as it was welcome. Hyland and captain Thornton had just been hauled off, to be replaced by recent signings John McKeown and Richie Purdy, when McKeown started the move that led to the all-important goal.

The Collon native played the ball through from midfield to Griffin and he took off towards goal before releasing a well-disguised reverse pass into the path of Ashe who finished in style with a low shot to Kelly’s right.

Purdy, an 11th-hour loan signing from Shamrock Rovers, looked lively alongside McKeown in the latter stages, but Purdy’s former teammate Gareth McCaffrey was perhaps suffering the effects of playing two games in eight days as he made little impact throughout.

With several other players also under-performing it was no wonder that Drogheda failed to get a proper stranglehold on the game, even after going ahead, and Cabinteely - whose starting XI averaged 19.5 years of age - sensed that a point was there for them.

They forced five corner kicks in as many minutes, a couple of those needlessly conceded, as the Boynesiders looked increasingly edgy. Thankfully several of those corners were poorly directed and the others were dealt with comfortably, while McGuinness wasn’t overly troubled by a Hanrahan half-volley that flew over the bar in the 89th minute.

Four minutes of stoppage time followed and the final whistle couldn’t come soon enough for Drogheda and their supporters. The three points is welcome, but against the better teams in the division, particularly Limerick who visit United Park this Friday - such a level of performance simply won’t be enough. •A minute’s silence was observed before kick-off, in memory of Angela McEvoy, grandmother of firstteam player Sean Brennan, who passed away during the week. There was no stand-out player on either side on Friday night, but Ashe produced the one moment of magic with an intelligent run and classy finish which made it five goals from his last seven appearances.

The players who ran him closest were defenders Gallagher, Farragher and Dunne, Marc Griffin who had one of his best games in a Drogheda shirt, and Sean Brennan who was Drogheda’s best midfielder despite suffering the loss of his grandmother earlier in the week. Cruciate injuries are notoriously hard to recover from, but are we beginning to see the best of striker Marc Griffin, and will the hard-working striker be rewarded with his first Drogheda goal in the near future?

There have been signs that the former Dundalk star is starting to find his feet, with his exquisite back-heel pass a highlight of Friday’s game against Cabinteely.

He hasn’t been able to score against the two worst teams in the league in the last two home games, so how ironic if he broke his duck against mighty Limerick this Friday!

PW Limerick FC 19 18 Drogheda Utd 19 10 UCD 19 10 Cobh Ramb 19 8 Shelbourne 19 7 Waterford Utd 19 6 Cabinteely FC 19 3 Athlone Town 19 2 D 1 5 4 4 1 2 3 4 L F 0 69 4 27 5 37 7 24 11 26 11 31 13 16 13 19 A Pt 17 55 20 35 28 34 28 28 28 22 45 20 37 12 46 10