SOCCER LEAGUE OF IRELAND:Bohemians 2 Galway Utd 0 Oman 71 Byrne pen 90
BOHEMIANS’ RECENT record at home, combined with Galway’s three straight defeats on the road, suggested the Dubliners would ease past their visitors like a midsummer’s breeze at Dalymount Park last night.
In the end it all proved a little more challenging than that but, having fought valiantly for a share of the spoils, United were gently blown away in the last 20 minutes when goals from Ken Oman and, almost inevitably, Jason Byrne moved Bohs clear at the top of the Premier Division table.
The visitors started brightly enough and weren’t overawed by the task of challenging the champions except up front where, on the couple of occasions they managed to carve out chances early on, there was a touch of panic about the manner in which they were squandered.
Pat Fenlon opted to play with Byrne as a lone striker and though the 31-year-old has been in outstanding form this season, he looked more than a little isolated in the first half with Gary Deegan rarely providing the support required from in front of the midfield to put the visitors’ defence under any sort of sustained pressure.
Most of the home side’s moves forward went through Joseph Ndo down the right but Iarfhlaith Davoren made life difficult enough for the midfielder who struggled to do better than a couple of lofted crosses which failed to trouble goalkeeper Barry Ryan.
Byrne, meanwhile, spent his time trying to shake off Shane Guthrie and Garry Breen but there were only fleeting opportunities to test Ryan, the best of them coming from a fine Paul Keegan through ball while Deegan forced the former St Patrick’s Athletic goalkeeper into a fine stop with a close -range effort from an angle and Keegan came close to beating him with a curling free from distance that Ndo feigned a touch on.
Fenlon looked to change things at the break by replacing the Cameroon international with Neale Fenn and almost immediately Foster’s defence started to look a little more stretched.
Still, the opening goal came, at least indirectly, from the sort of situation that United had been dealing with rather well over the opening 45 minutes.
Anto Whelan this time got a cross in from the right and Byrne got there ahead of Murphy. The striker should have headed home but the ball came back off the crossbar and the visitors scrambled it behind. From Keegan’s corner, though, Oman got enough of a touch to send the ball bouncing through defenders and beyond the stranded goalkeeper.
It won’t be remembered as one of the side’s prettiest goals come the end of the season but it may have stood out as one of the most important had it not been for Byrne’s late penalty.
Not long after, the hosts came close to producing what would surely have been one of the best this year by any side with Fenn winning possession with some conviction close to his own area before starting a sweeping move forward that concluded with Graham Carey pushing his low cross a yard too far beyond Byrne in the centre.
By now, however, United were having to chase things and as they committed themselves a little more to attack so they started to leave gaps at the back.
Sure enough, Bohs caught them on the break with the ball moved swiftly forward to Carey who picked out Keegan perfectly and as the midfielder sought to line up his short a combination of challenges from behind by Breen and Michael McGrath brought him crashing to the ground.
Byrne stepped up to confidently bag his 13th league goal of the season and the icing on the home side’s cake came in the form of the news from United Park.
BOHEMIANS:Murphy; Murphy, Shelley, Oman, Powell; Ndo (Fenn, half-time), Cronin, Keegan, Brennan (S Byrne, 92 mins); Deegan (Carey, 70 mins); J Byrne.
GALWAY UNITED:Ryan; Conneely, Guthrie, Breen, Davoren; Cooke, McGrath, Russell (McBride, 80 mins), O'Brien (O'Toole, 90 mins); O'Shea, Edwards (Molloy, 69 mins).
Referee:A Buttimer (Cork).
