Kilduff is having
SSE AIRTRICITY LEAGUE
CIARAN Kilduff added another chapter to Dundalk’s incredible European journey with his equaliser against AZ Alkmaar on Thursday night.
The striker came off the bench late on at the AFAS Stadion at a time when his side were a goal down and a man down following the 71st minute dismissal of captain Stephen O’Donnell.
However, he secured a history-making point for Stephen Kenny’s side with an 89th minute header from Daryl Horgan’s free kick to help Dundalk become the first Irish team to claim a point in European competition.
The SSE Airtricity League champions still had to survive nine minutes of relentless pressure from AZ before claiming their point, with Kilduff admitting he got emotional at the end as he left the field with the match ball.
It has been a season of frustration and setbacks for the 27-year-old, with his season looking like it was over in mid-April when he suffered a broken back in an EA Sports Cup match against St Patrick’s Athletic.
Even when he made a miraculous recovery from that injury, illness cost him his place in the side just ahead of the club’s European campaign with Kilduff having to look on from the sidelines as his replacement David McMillan went on a run of 11 goals in six matches, including braces against both FH Hafnarfjordur and BATE Borisov in the Champions League qualifiers.
The Kilcock man then missed the club’s Champions League play-off second leg tie away to Legia Warsaw in Poland with a knee injury sustained in training three days before the game and wasn’t expected back until the end of this month.
However, yet again Kilduff showed his unique powers of recovery by returning last Friday week to score the only goal against former club UCD in the FAI Cup but even that paled in significance compared to his header on Thursday night.
Normally you need to score a hat-trick to keep the match ball but after a rollercoaster few months, Kilduff said there was no way he was giving it up to referee Clayton Pisani at the full-time whistle.
“I had my own rules,” he grinned.
“The referee asked me for it and I just said ‘no way’. I was afraid he’d give me a second booking but I just kept walking.That’s in my bag now and will be going on the mantelpiece because I missed the game with Legia through injury, which was disappointing personally, so I was making sure I got a souvenir from this one.
“I have had a difficult couple of months to be honest and I got a bit emotional on the pitch by the end of it. It was kind of a big relief for me and a release because the manager has been good to me and so have the players and everyone keeps me positive. It has been a difficult time but thankfully tonight I can repay them all and the supporters,” said Kilduff.
The striker said he bore no ill-feeling whatsoever to McMillan for his goalscoring exploits in recent months but admitted it was nice to have his own moment in the sun at last after his testing time.
“I have no bad or ill feeling towards Davey. He deserves everything he gets because he’s a top striker and a good friend of mine so I wouldn’t begrudge him anything.
“I did go around Europe watching him get the goals on the great nights but, to be honest, he put me on the