Needing a win to keep alive their promotion hopes alive, Galway left it late to collect both points with Paul Conroy scoring a decisive goal in the 68th minute to deny bottom of the table Longford at Glennon Brothers Pearse Park.

Trailing by four points at one stage of the second half and looking in trouble, Galway were thrown a lifeline in the 56th minute when a costly mistake in the Longford defence allowed Eoin Concannon in for a gift goal and moments later Niall Coleman added a point to leave the sides all square.

Although Longford regained the lead soon after with a fine point from the boot of Seán McCormack, a fifth score from Michael Martin in the 61st minute left it level again.

And it looked like finishing that way before Conroy flicked the ball to the net after connecting with a free from Martin. Defender Gary Sice then landed a point to make victory secure.

That was a killer blow for Longford, who have yet to pick up a point in this very competitive division and look destined to be relegated with just three games remaining. To make matters worse Paul Barden has suffered another injury setback. But it could have been a completely different story after McCormack scored two goals in the early stages of the second half.

Galway held a slender 1-6 to 1-5 lead at the break with the first-half goals coming from Michael Meehan (11 mins) and Longford’s Donal McElligott (17 mins) and the visitors made a great start to the second half with two quick points from Meehan and Concannon.

McCormack replied immediately with a fine goal and when the same player shot to the net again three minutes later a home win was looking the likely outcome but Galway eventually came out on top.