FAI Cup Second round/ Shamrock Rovers 2 Sligo Rovers 3: If there's one thing worse than having insult added to injury it must be having injury controversially added to defeat.
That, though, is what happened to Shamrock Rovers on Saturday night at Tolka Park where the medical staff's concerns that their goalkeeper, Barry Murphy, might have seriously hurt his back prompted his removal to hospital late on and did much to deepen the gloom within the home camp afterwards.
Yesterday, the prognosis had improved to the extent that the club was confident Murphy will be back playing within three weeks.
At the final whistle, however, which arrived only after 18 minute of added time had been played, Pat Scully was clearly seriously put out and not just by the fact that the club's run without lifting a trophy it used to win on average once every three years or so will now be extended to beyond two decades.
"You can't be critical of referees these days but I've got to say that I was very disappointed by the way the whole thing was handled," said the Shamrock Rovers boss. "I just said to him as we were coming off that I hope he sleeps well tonight because our player is in hospital."
His displeasure sprang from an incident involving one of his own midfielders, Dean Lawrence, who, playing in defence through the second half, collided with Murphy while trying to shield the ball's passage to the goalkeeper under pressure from Sligo striker, Fahrudin Kudozovic.
From the press box, the whole thing looked a terrible mishap prompted, perhaps, by Murphy's failure to collect the ball cleanly at the first attempt and if Lawrence thought he had been fouled he made very little of it. However, Scully alleged that Kudozovic had pushed his opponent into the goalkeeper and then stepped up to tap the loose ball home.
The manager sounded a little like a man who was concluding there had to have been a push because the alternative was too far fetched for his liking. Television footage proved far from conclusive either way although it has to be said the striker's post match observation, that he "didn't remember" pushing Lawrence was not the most compelling denial ever uttered.
None of which would have mattered quite as much had the goal not proved to be the winner for a Sligo team that had initially come from behind then surrendered a lead of their own in what was a highly entertaining FAI cup contest.
The home side led early on thanks to a wonderful headed goal by Tadhg Purcell, only to trail at the interval as a result of defending Scully described as "suicidal" that allowed first Kudozovic then Matthew Judge to beat Murphy.
Without a handful of their more experienced players and sorely missing a couple of key defenders, the Dubliners repeatedly looked vulnerable at the back against a team that showed an admirable desire to get the ball down and play their way into the home side's area.
The hosts, though, could hardly be faulted for their own efforts to haul themselves back into the game after weathering a tough opening spell to the second half. Indeed, they seemed to be back on course to take something from the game with a little less than a half hour to play when Andy Myler chested down Mark Langtry's through ball, turned and rather neatly slotted home.
Within a minute, though, Murphy was curled up in pain at the other end, Kudozovic had restored his side's lead and Shamrock Rovers, so long the cup specialists, were on their way out, empty handed once more.
SHAMROCK ROVERS: Murphy (S O'Brien, 79 mins); Lawrence, Ryan, G O'Brien, Walsh (Duffy, 59 mins), Pender; Rowe, Barrett (Langtry, 42 mins), Cassidy; Purcell, Myler.
SLIGO ROVERS: Brush; Coleman, Peers (Vasas, 90+13 mins), McKenzie, Kelly; Cash (Flannery, 85 mins), O'Grady, Hughes, Manson; Judge (McCartney, 85 mins), Kudozovic.
Referee: H Whoriskey(Meath).
