Meath…1-11
Longford…0-13
Late drama involving Meath teams is about as surprising as somebody wearing green on St Patrick’s Day. We may never get used to it, but who cares as long as we’re coming out the right side of the action? Not too many. Today, thanks to telling contributions from substitutes Pearse Sheridan and Darragh Reilly, there’s another volume of Meath: Encyclopaedia Escapia required!
Fielding a team featuring many players who either won Leinster MFC medals in 2020 or provincial and All Ireland medals at the aforementioned grade last summer, John McCarthy’s charges were slow into stride, with a goal by Ruairi Kinsella after 20 minutes not only brought them on level terms with their hosts, but was actually their first interaction with the scoreboard operator.
It proved to be just the kick-start Meath needed as they went up through the gears considerably thereafter and ended the first half with a somewhat unlikely 1-04 to 0-06 lead.
McCarthy’s men actually finished the half the stronger, as scores from Jamie Browne, Kinsella, Niall Finnerty and team captain Eoghan Frayne left them 1-09 to 0-09 at the turnaround.
The sides traded scores early in the second half, but by the 56th minute Longford’s sharpshooter Jack Duggan had them level. Indeed Meath were probably lucky he didn’t leave them in an even deeper ditch when striking the butt of post with a penalty.
Meath substitute Adam McDonnell was black carded arising out of the incident which led to the penalty. Keelin McGann then put the locals back in front and, to the majority of teams, a point down and a man down with the clock in the red, most would write it off as another case of what could or should have been.
Somewhere deeply ingrained in the Meath DNA are the two lines of advice Sean Boylan imparted to his first group of Meath players all those years ago “Never give up” and. equally as importantly, “Never go down”. Here, they needed trailer loads of both, and skilfully found it. The latest act of escapism being a case of the bench high press lifting them over the line.
Firstly as Oldcastle’s Pearse Sheridan split the posts to equalise two minutes into stoppage time before, after another two, St Ultan’s lad O’Reilly fisted over the one that mattered most of all.
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