Meath's avalanche of goals buries Dublin

THE ETERNAL verities of one sporting rivalry might have been confirmed in Bloemfontein but yesterday in Croke Park the wheel turned in the GAA Leinster football championship. Dublin, in search of a fifth successive title, were undone by some top-class Meath finishing. Although defeated by just 14 scores to 13, the champions managed to concede five goals as part of that total while offering only points in return.

Given the options on offer a fairly reasonable 60,035 turned out for the latest instalment in one of football’s big rivalries and saw a hungry and committed Meath hang on during an evenly contested first half and pull away to win by 11 points, the biggest margin between the counties in nearly 50 years.

Bridging an actual 50-year gap were the footballers of Louth, who eventually confirmed their superiority, 1-15 to 2-10, over Westmeath by the end of an afternoon of high excitement, which puts the border county into a first Leinster final since losing to Offaly in 1960. Colm Judge got the critical goal in the 58th minute.

The key questions before the Dublin-Meath match concerned which of two less than impregnable defences could hold the opposing forwards. In the end the result decisively swung on the challengers’ ability to get behind Dublin’s rearguard and finish with icy ruthlessness.

Former All Star Stephen Bray led the way for Meath with 2-1, including a goal in either half – the second breaking the back of the champions’ faltering claims.

“We know Stephen is a very good player,” said his manager Eamon O’Brien, “but you’re not going to get 15 players playing well on every day. Stephen hasn’t scored for us or played as well as he would have liked to his own high standard in the last couple of games.

“But I said to him, ‘Stephen, we don’t want you playing well when we’re winning, we want you playing well when we need you’ and he answered the call today when we needed him.”

For Dublin manager Pat Gilroy, the road ahead is through the qualifiers, a route untravelled by the county for six years. “We started well today,” he said, “and then gave away a goal and it was just an avalanche of goals in the second half. We’re doing bits and pieces very well but you can’t concede goals like that. We have to sort that out during the qualifiers.”

In what was the busiest weekend of the year for the GAA championship, it was Galway who will feel most relieved to be still in contention. Trailing Sligo in what looked like a wind tunnel in Pearse Stadium by at one stage nine points Joe Kernan’s team, reduced to 14 men for nearly the entire second half after Seán Armstrong picked up a second yellow, somehow banked 1-2 in the dying minutes of the match to force a replay.

The crucial goal was expertly laid off by the veteran Pádraic Joyce and finished by debutant Eoin Concannon, who burst from nowhere onto the pass to rifle into the net. A hotly debated free in the last minute was entrusted to wing back Gareth Bradshaw and he very carefully converted for an extraordinary escape.

In the qualifiers Mayo crashed to a surprise defeat by Longford and John O’Mahony called time on his four-year managerial tenure. Another great turn-up at the weekend came in the hurling qualifier, which saw Carlow overturn their Leinster defeat by Laois.

• A minute's silence was observed yesterday at Croke Park to honour the memory of Dermot Earley, one of the most distinguished footballers in the history of the GAA.