Sport

Martin times first goal nicely

Shamrock Rovers - 1 Longford Town - 1: John Martin scored his first goal for Longford to earn them a point they fully deserved…

Paul Buttner at Richmond Park
Wed Apr 07 2004 - 01:00

Shamrock Rovers - 1 Longford Town - 1: John Martin scored his first goal for Longford to earn them a point they fully deserved having played for almost an hour with 10 men.

The game was fast and furious from the start; the sides knocked the ball around with gusto and all that was lacking in a highly entertaining first half was a goal.

Longford enjoyed much of the early possession with Shane Barrett, who was proving elusive to the Rovers defence, having a shot blocked away by Jason McGuinness before shooting over the top when he ought to have done better after exhibiting some neat ball control to create the opening.

In between Seán Dillon had got forward to bring the first save of the night from Noel Mooney with a deflected 25-yard shot after textbook interplay between Barrett and Dessie Baker.

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Having survived that early flurry and got their second wind, Rovers soon played the Longford defence into trouble.

Mark Rutherford tracked a diagonal ball from his opposite winger Shane Robinson into the area to get the slightest touch, only to see the ball trickle away and come back off a post.

Sadly, after such a riveting 45 minutes, the biggest drama was to be the sending off of Longford central defender Graham Gartland on 36 minutes for a lunging tackle from behind on Trevor Molloy, needlessly committed inside the Rovers half of the pitch.

That gave Rovers the initiative and it was little surprise that their pressure from the resumption eventually resulted in a goal on 65 minutes.

Rutherford won a corner, which Robinson flighted over for his captain, Terry Palmer, to head home.

Longford regrouped, fought back and were rewarded on 79 minutes.

A free-kick into the Rovers area from Alan Kirby wasn't defended particularly well.

The ball ricocheted off several bodies, including that of referee O'Neill, before falling to substitute Martin, on the pitch just two minutes, on the edge of the area and he crashed a shot to the net off the crossbar.

SHAMROCK ROVERS: N Mooney; Gough, McGuinness, Palmer, Doyle; Robinson, O'Halloran, Caffrey, Rutherford; Molloy, Kelly (D Mooney, 85 mins).

LONGFORD TOWN: O'Brien; Murphy, Ferguson, Gartland, Dillon; Kirby, Perth, Keogh (Martin, 77 mins), Baker (Prunty, 37 mins); Keegan (Francis, 83 mins), Barrett.

Referee: J O'Neill (Waterford).