Senior final repeat ends all square

DUNDALK GAELS NEWTOWN BLUES 1-7 0-10

A last minute free from Derek Crilly rescued a point for Dundalk Gaels at DkIT on Thursday night.

The repeat of the 2017 Senior Championship Final was played in testing conditions but proved to be very well contested throughout and in the end a draw was a fair result.

There was little to separate the teams throughout the game and points were exchanged in the opening 30 minutes, with the Blues holding a slender 0-5 to 0-4 when the teams went in for their half time break. The Gaels hopes suffered a setback when Eamonn Kenny was sent off for a second yellow card inside the opening 15 minutes.

The Blues had the better of the chances in the second half and looked to be in control only for a Crilly goal to keep the Gaels in contention. The visitors edged into the lead entering the closing stages but the Gaels were not to be denied and after battling to the end they got their reward when Crilly fired over from a late free.

GAELS: Micheal Lambert; David McComish, Jamie Faulkner, Conor Morgan; Eamonn Kenny, Oisin Murray, David Maloney; Derek Crilly 1-4, Sean Murray; Gary Shevlin 0-1, Jamie Clarke 0-1, Barry Watters 0-1; Emmet Lindsay, Niall Hearty, Chris Sweeney. Subs: P McGinnity, A Rafferty, A McSorley, J Lynch.

BLUES: Danny Rothwell; Leigh Synnott, Aidan O’Brien, Paul Kellegher; Ian Connor, Kevin Carr, Ronan Levins; Chris Reid, Stephen Moonan 0-2; Robert Carr 0-5, Conor Branigan 0-2, Lorcan McQuillan; Jamie Doherty, Conor Moore 0-1, Niall Costello. Subs: Conor Farrell for A O’Brien, Luke Cormican for R Levins, James Moore for J Doherty.