LEAGUE OF IRELAND Dundalk 2 Drogheda Utd 2:DERBY GAMES have a habit of being scrappy affairs and yesterday's at Oriel Park was no exception, with both sides struggling to produce much by way of quality on what, in the presence of a decent crowd and the television cameras, had the feel of a big occasion.

The hosts, in particular, looked out of sorts for the bulk of the afternoon but a late fight-back after Drogheda had been reduced to 10 men earned them a point.

Manager Ian Foster knows they need to improve greatly on yesterday’s performance if the season ahead is not to be challenging.

“We’re a million miles from being the finished article,” observed Foster afterwards.

“We have to close down teams far more effectively than we did today and then use the ball more effectively when we have it. We have to start games more brightly too.”

That his side weren’t left empty handed after falling two behind – to goals by Glen Fitzpatrick and, from the penalty spot, Joe Kendrick – had a good deal to do with the decisions by referee Damien Hancock first to send off Michel Daly and then, moments later, to award a penalty for handball with just under half an hour left to play.

A glance at the card count might suggest that the referee had a fair bit to deal with.

In reality, half of the afternoon’s eight bookings were for kicking the ball away after the whistle had gone with another handed out for dissent. One of Daly’s two bookings was for the former offence and there was a sense that the match official had become trapped by the need to appear consistent.

That appeared to be the case with the Dundalk penalty which was a carbon copy of one awarded to the visitors during the first half. Both involved a cross from the right being blocked by the arm of a defender and in neither case did the offending player look as though he knew too much about it.

Alan Mathews appeared to think so although he was careful about articulating his views. He had, he admitted, little option but to concede that if Tom Miller deserved to be penalised in the first half for handball inside the box then so did Brian King in the second.

He was a little less understanding about how the balance of the game had been altered by Daly’s dismissal, however, and didn’t seem to take any consolation from the fact that, while Paul Skinner had been powerless to prevent Neale Fenn pulling one back for the hosts from the spot, the goalkeeper should have done much better with a shot by the striker nine minutes from time than simply parrying the ball into the path of Fahrudin Kuduzovic who gratefully tapped the rebound home from eight yards.

Wayne Hatswell then came close to grabbing the extra to points for the home side with a 25-yard strike from an angle that came clattering back off the crossbar, but the visitors might have snatched a winner too with Fitzpatrick ruled offside after sidefooting home and Peter Cherrie then doing very well to keep Jamie Harris’s close range header out.

DUNDALK: Cherrie; Breen, Burns, Hatswell; Kelly, Melligan, Maher, Cawley (Miller, 16 mins), Gaynor; Fenn, Kuduzovic.

DROGHEDA UNITED: Skinner; Treacy (Duffy, 7 mins), McNally, Harris, Kendrick; O'Connor; King, Daly, McGill, Flood; Fitzpatrick (R Brennan, 84 mins).

Referee: D Hancock(Dublin).