McDonald and Laois rediscover the flair

Leinster Football First round: A slow day in Croke Park, and nothing about the 12-point win for Laois to set the pulse racing. As casual and drab a championship match as imaginable, with the atmosphere of a kick-about. Roll on the bigger days.

Officially the attendance was put at 17,142 for all three games. Apparently 11,000 tickets were distributed free to primary schools. But with a little effort one could have hand-counted those who were left at the end.

What saved it from becoming a complete non-event were the cracking individual displays from Laois players like Beano McDonald, finally doing at senior level what he's promised for too long. The elevation of Noel Garvan. And the revelation of Ross Munnelly's true talents.

For Wexford, all hopes of a step forward from last summer ended with two steps back. From a competitive point of view they were never in the game. Instead, they just hung on, as if chasing pacemakers in a mile race, before appearing to drop out altogether.

Laois, though, will come away with more than just the good work-out. Confidence has been restored after taking the heavy hit from Tyrone in the league final a week ago. But with that comes the guarantee that they won't enjoy such fluency when they play Offaly at home in Portlaoise on Saturday week.

Some pressure, too, comes off Mick O'Dwyer. After last Sunday there was the real threat that their league form was a flash in the pan. Instead, the Kerry maestro was looking content again, complete with that mischievous smile.

"My biggest problem today was to get the lads thinking properly again," he said. "We had a bit of a disaster here last day, but even the professional teams will have that now and again. But we did a few hard days during the week, and I think that shook them up again.

"And today we played good football, kicked some good scores. Got back to something normal like our league games, and played again for one another.

"And yes, some of our players did exceptionally well. And then I think we were that bit sharper than Wexford."

The superiority that Laois enjoyed throughout the field can be traced to several key players. Garvan accompanied Pauric Clancy at midfield like O'Dwyer had previously only dreamed about, and their opposition - Willie Carley and Rory Stafford - hardly got a look in.

There were two notable changes too from Laois' familiar league line-up. Munnelly, still only 20, was given his first starting opportunity in the forward line in place of Stephen Kelly, and he delivered a supernova display. His five-point contribution was evenly spread throughout the game, including three frees, while his movement on and off the ball was always spectacular.

"Looks pretty good, don't he?" offered O'Dwyer.

Aidan Fennelly was also given preference to Derek Conroy in defence, but that change was less notable in that their defence was never actually tested. The Wexford forward line, albeit weakened by injury, failed consistently to create any danger.

With so much open space at the other end there was the chance for all six Laois forwards to shine. Ian Fitzgerald wasted nothing and scored the game's only goal on 12 minutes following the perfect creation from Clancy, and interjection from Damien Delaney. Colm Parkinson started brightly too, but his game was cut short with an ankle injury.

So when Beano first pulled off his trademark turn and kick on 19 minutes the writing was already on the wall for Wexford. Trailing 1-4 to 0-1, it took two late points from Leigh O'Brien and Matty Forde to leave the half-time score any way hopeful, 1-7 to 0-6.

Still, things continued in a casual light, and with 10 minutes to play Wexford were still hanging on by five points. Until Beano hit full stride, Munnelly awed yet again, and substitute Kieran Kelly came to the fore.

Laois hit six of the sweetest points in succession and that was that. From then on it was target practice.

When Wexford manager Dom Twomey eventually emerged from the sorrowful dressing-room there were no excuses: "I suppose we were hanging in there for around 10 minutes of the second half, but then our performance really went down. And theirs went up.

"The heads did drop at the end as well, and it was very disappointing to lose like that."

The absences of players like Thomas Howlin, Redmond Barry and Colm Morris were difficult to disguise, though Twomey wasn't exactly overexcited by the mention of the qualifiers.

"We'll try to regroup," he said, "and hope there is still that thing called the learning curve."

LAOIS: F Byron; T Kelly, C Byrne, J Higgins; D Rooney, K Fitzpatrick, A Fennelly; P Clancy, N Garvan (0-1); R Munnelly (0-5, 3f), I Fitzgerald (1-1), C Parkinson; B McDonald (0-6), M Lawlor (0-3, 1f), D Delaney (0-2, 2f). Subs: D Conroy for Fitzpatrick (half-time), K Kelly (0-1) for Parkinson (inj, 38 mins), D Sweeney for Delaney (59 mins). Yellow card: K Fitzpatrick (35 mins).

WEXFORD: J Cooper; R Mageean, P Wallace, N Murphy; P Curtis, D Murphy (0-1), D Breen; W Carley (0-1), R Stafford; D Fogarty, L O'Brien (0-1), M Forde (0-4, 3f); S Doran (0-1), P Colfer, J Hegarty (0-1). Subs: T Mahon (0-1) for Fogarty (42 mins), R Mallon for Colfer (50 mins), T Wall for Mageean (55 mins), R Hassey for Wallace (59 mins). Yellow card: W Carley (45 mins).

Referee: G Kineavy (Roscommon)