Dundalk surrender top-flight status

They have had some good nights up around Oriel Park down the years, but they all seemed like a very distant memory during Dundalk's defeat by UCD which ended the home club's 73-year unbroken run of competing at the highest level of the Irish game.

Some 350 spectators showed up to see the nine times champions' always slender hopes of salvaging their premier division status gradually evaporate in another terribly disappointing contest.

Still, the tame way in which Dundalk's top-flight status was finally surrendered, and UCD's secured, will have been another blow to followers of a club who have suffered more than they could possibly have imagined since they saw Dermot Keely lead Dundalk to their last title just four years ago.

As so often this season, the home side were always second best last night. A team riding its luck might have actually taken the lead after half an hour when David Crawley's low-driven free came back off Barry Ryan's legs and John Brennan managed to direct his follow-up shot from a yard or two out onto the underside of the crossbar.

Luck, though, isn't something that has been spotted around Oriel in recent times and Dundalk's meagre ration of it had all been consumed during a first half in which Ciaran Eoin Bennis and Ciaran Kavanagh (twice) both should have turned the visiting side's superiority into something more tangible.

In the second period the students were to be less forgiving of their hosts' shortcomings. After Eamon McLaughlin had gone close to putting his side in front, Mick O'Byrne finally broke the deadlock. Clive Delaney's long through ball evaded almost half the Dundalk team before the Dubliners' top scorer neatly turned inside Brennan and hit a shot that slipped through Steve Williams's legs on its way to the net.

Needing a win, the home side might have been expected to start getting forward with a certain degree of abandon for the remainder of the game. But, in reality, there was little change in the shape of the match with UCD still comfortably on top and looking well worth the second goal which Kavanagh set up for Bennis eight minutes short of the final whistle.

Predictably there were starkly contrasting atmospheres in the dressing rooms afterwards with Dr Tony O'Neill, Theo Dunne and the UCD players all looking quietly relieved that the threat of the drop had passed. Across the corridor the shock was only really starting to sink in. "I feel numb," sighed the home club's longest serving player, Tom McNulty. "I've never experienced anything like it, it's like losing a member of the family."

For manager Jim McLaughlin, there seems only to be the Finn Harps match next week before a generally sparkling career draws to a close. "it's the saddest night of my career and the saddest in the history of the club, he said afterwards. "Obviously I'll do the honourable thing and offer my resignation and hopefully it will be accepted. After that, the main thing is that the club is still in football. It's a great club is still in football. It's a great club and I know they can rise again."

Dundalk: Williams; Brennan, Melvin, Reddish, Crawley; Campbell, McNulty, Fortune, Hoey; Ward, Martin. Subs: Harte and McGinnity for Fortune and Martin (63 mins).

UCD: Ryan; Brett, McDonnell, Delaney, Mahon; McLaughlin, Kavanagh, Lynch, O'Donnell; Hoey, Bennis.

Referee: G Perry (Dublin).