Louth leave it late

Louth 0-11 Roscommon 0-10: A fisted point from JP Rooney capped a remarkable injury-time comeback by Louth in Drogheda on Saturday night as Roscommon crashed out of the championship.

Louth looked to have done enough to force extra-time but then substitute Christy Grimes won possession in his own half and played a long ball to Shane Lennon. Lennon turned his marker and laid off to Rooney, who calmly punched over.

Grimes had levelled the match one minute earlier when he converted a free from his hands.

Despite coming back from the dead in those closing stages, Louth were the better side in the first half and they opened the scoring within a minute of the throw-in through Paddy Keenan.

On 17 minutes, Michael Ryan pointed for Roscommon from a tight angle to level the match at four points each but that was to be their last score of the half.

Louth, on the other hand, finished strongly and Lennon gave them a narrow lead before Darren Clarke converted a free with a minute left in the half.

Lennon stretched their advantage straight after the break but that score, and the impact of half-time substitute Stephen Lohan, saw Roscommon take control for the next 20 minutes.

Val Daly's side rattled off five points in a row during that period and, in truth, Louth looked down and out as they trailed 0-9 to 0-7.

Credit should go to Daly's opposite number, Val Andrews, who made a number of changes in an attempt to stay in the match and one in particular got Louth back into the midfield battle as Grimes replaced David Devaney.

Paddy Matthews was one player to make way in the closing stages but not before he kicked a couple of points either side of a Karol Mannion effort for Roscommon.

That left a point in it with just a couple of minutes remaining and Louth sent the home crowd wild with that dramatic fightback to equal their best run in the qualifiers since their inception in 2001.

LOUTH: S McCoy; A Page, B Reilly, J Carr; C Sheridan, A Hoey, S Gerrard; D Devaney, J Kermath; M Stanfield, P Keenan (0-1), D Clarke (0-4, two frees); P Matthews (0-3), S Lennon (0-1), J P Rooney (0-1). Subs: N McDonnell for Stanfield (half-time), C Grimes (0-1, one free) for Devaney (51 mins), O McDonnell for Clarke (62 mins), R Kelly for Matthews (68 mins).

ROSCOMMON: S Curran; J Egan, J Whyte, S McDermott; M Ryan (0-1), D Casey, J Rogers (0-1); S O'Neill, B Higgins; K Mannion (0-2), F Grehan, E Kenny; G Cox, J Dunning (0-1), G Heneghan (0-5, three frees). Subs: Stephen Lohan for Kenny (half-time), A Dooney for Cox (46 mins).

Referee: M McGrath (Donegal).