AT the end of yesterday's All Ireland B football final in Carrick on Shannon, a frisson ran through those in the crowd of 5,000 who noticed Longford manager, Eamonn Coleman on the pitch looking around for referee Joe Woods and then darting towards him purposefully.

The excitement was understandable when you take into account the context: the Dublin referee had handed Fermanagh a 13 metre free in the depths of injury time - which enabled them to take the match to a replay on December 8th. Expecting an animated harangue, spectators instead witnessed Coleman smiling and holding out his hand to Woods.

The Longford manager's view a few minutes later was nonetheless acerbic when he talked about the free, awarded against Padraig Farrell for fouling Raymond Curran on the endline after an umpire had signalled a wide.

"It was a free for a draw. The referee blew the whistle and signalled for that striking with the fist. He told me he gave the free for a push in the back. So it was either for striking or a push in the back but he made two different decisions. And to start off with, the ball was wide - because I was on the endline."

Was he saying the referee played for a draw?

"Are you trying to get me into trouble with the GAA?"

Perhaps mindful of the prospect of an impending replay, he was otherwise complimentary about Woods's performance and philosophical about his team's display.

"It was a good game, a tough game. Probably a bad decision against us, but that's the way it goes. You take the good with the bad. We'll be back on the 8th of December and we'll be ready. Some (of the players) had tremendous games and some weren't good enough. But you get that. It was a tough game and to be fair to the referee. It was well refereed all the way through. I didn't agree with that decision but I thought he did a good job."

On a heavy pitch, but in mostly pleasant conditions, the final was disappointing - closely contested, certainly, but riddled with errors and only rarely bursting into passages of quality football.

The most impressive attacking play came from Fermanagh in short bursts, but it probably shouldn't have been enough to equal their more solid - if one paced opponents.

Both sides lost an important attacker before the throw in left corner forward Padraig Davis dropping off the Longford team because of a dose of flu and Raymond Gallagher failing a fitness test for Fermanagh. Bernard Donoghue filled the vacant wing forward position on the Longford team.

In Dessie Barry, Longford had the most potent forward on the pitch for most of the match but they nearly always failed to supply him with decent ball. With Fermanagh's Clive Fitzpatrick and substitute Tommy Callaghan doing a good job on the veteran corner forward, he was kept to a single point from play.

Fermanagh started exuberantly and rattled off three points in as many minutes, from the sixth, to lead 0-3 to 0-1. Their opening score should have been a goal after a tremendous kicked pass out of defence by Raymond Curran found Rory Gallagher, whose glorious placed ball sent Kieran Donnelly unmarked in on coal where he unambitiously pointed.

The Northerners' momentum flagged and Longford came into the match. Only two injury time points, from Niall Rooney and Rory Gallagher, who had a poor afternoon with the placed ball and took on too many kicks that yesterday were outside his range, kept Fermanagh within a point at the interval 0-5 to 0-6.

The two teams played remarkably similar football - and for periods did so in a remarkably inept fashion. The obsessive use of short ball out of defence would have given the impression of incessant slow motion replays but for there always being some variation on how the ball was to be dropped or eventually given away.

There was hardly a single clean catch at midfield for the whole afternoon but, in fairness, the conditions were uncooperative. The consequent scrabbling around after breaking ball was unedifying, but Longford did it best with their half back line combative.

This was particularly true of Colin Hannify, who voyaged up for a second half point at a time when his forwards were suffering from an odd ailment which involved being compulsively shot shy combined with woeful inaccuracy, although a fine save by Cormac McAdam in the 35th minute also contributed to Longford's lack of scoring.

Enda Barden eventually pushed them three points clear going into the third quarter but the introduction of Mark Gallagher pepped up Fermanagh and facilitated their revival. He nearly squeezed in a goal towards the end but it was left to Rory Gallagher, from close range, to kick a couple of frees, including the mildly controversial equaliser in the third minute of injury time.