Castlebar Celtic 3
Salthill Devon 2
In game that featured as much action and commitment off the field as on it, Castlebar Celtic picked up their fourth win of the FAI Newstalk A League on Friday night in a sun baked Celtic Park. Declan Kilkelly's men were the first side to see off the Galway out fit this season and break their 100 per cent record in the competition so far, in a game the threatened to bubble over at times as some wild challenges were put in by both sides. But it was the sending off of substitute Michael Quirke only a matter of minutes after coming on as a first half replacement that put Celtic in the driving seat for the rest of the competition.
Peter Dravins went close right from the start when he flicked over a flick on by Chris Rowland, but Celtic only had to wait eight minutes for their first goal of the game. Salthill goalkeeper Martin Maranek was yellow cared for sliding out of his area with the ball in hand as he closed the gate on a Celtic attack. But the gate was left just enough a jar from the resulting free kick which Enda McGahon blasted to the back of the net with a great strike to put the hoops one up.
But it wasn't going to be all plain sailing as the Galway side drew the game level on 17 minutes when Mikey Gilmore had the easy task of rolling the ball into an unguarded net from six yards out, after Enda Dunne got in behind the Celtic back four, from a block down and James Jennings in the Celtic goal had no choice but to come out and try and narrow the angle. The visitors then came close to going into the lead when Gearoid O'Leidhinn saw his shot just fly over the bar, before Quirke's dismissal. In fact going down to ten men saw Salthill Devon enjoy their best period of the game with Dunne and Damien O'Reilly both having chances to put them into the lead.
Three minutes before the break, Sean McHale put his side back into poll position,the ball was played across the box where the industrious Peter Dravins flicked the ball back into the path of McHale who caught it just right to blast his volley home to the net.
The half time team talk's failed to defuse the wild challenges that went flying in around the park during the second half, but the game was killed off as a contest on 52 minutes when Peter Dravins saw his effort agonizingly come back off the post, but McGahon was there to apply the finish and grab his second goal of the game.
Three minutes into injury time Damien O'Reilly grabbed a late goal for Salthill Devon which only further infused the tackles on the pitch and the verbal's between both dugout and the final whistle brought the contest to a close, but not the back and forth between the managers of the sides as they walked back across the pitch to their respective sides.
Castlebar Celtic: J Jennings; M Hamilton, A Neary, A Stevenson, D Flynn; A McDonnell, C Rowland, S McHale, P Dravins, E McGahon, G O'Boyle Subs: S Ryan for S McHale (65 mins ), S Hynes for G O'Boyle (68 mins ), R O'Boyle for Dravins (74 mins )
Salthill Devon: M Maranek; R Winters, G O'Leidhinn, S Murphy, J Whelan; R O'Donnell. S Browne, R Porter, M Gilmore; D O'Reilly, E Dunne. Subs: M Quirke for O'Donnell (6 mins; inj ) R Larkin for Winters (72 mins ), A Cregg for Dunne (79 mins )
Ref: Jimmy Blake
