Dundalk 2 Waterford 2
Late headers from Patrick Hoban and Daniel Cleary rescued a share of the spoils for Dundalk against Waterford in Oriel Park on Friday night as the champions showed some fight ahead of their venture into Europe on Wednesday.
Goals from Matthew Smith and Kurtis Byrne looked like giving the visitors their first away win at the Co Louth venue since 2003 but a late fightback after Ali Coote was dismissed with 12 minutes to go ensured the home side escaped with a point.
While a third game without victory since the restart means the champions could be 10 points behind Shamrock Rovers by the end of the weekend, the fightback shown will at least give manager Vinny Perth some hope ahead of his side’s trip to Hungary for Wednesday’s Champions League first qualifying round tie with Slovenian champions NK Celje.
Waterford hit the front on 24 minutes when Tyreke Wilson slipped in Smith who cut inside Sean Hoare to slot past Gary Rogers.
Still trailing at the break, the home side made a triple change at the start of the second half but those plans quickly unravelled on 50 minutes when the Blues doubled their lead. A sloppy pass was picked up on by Byrne who made no mistake to fire to the bottom left hand corner.
That goal was a hammer blow to the Louth men but they were given some hope on 78 minutes when Waterford were reduced to 10 men after Coote picked up a second yellow card for a late challenge on Will Patching.
The comeback then began when Hoban rose to meet Murray’s corner to make it 2-1 with seven minutes left.
Then up popped Cleary in the 91st minute as he flicked on Murray’s corner with the effort creeping through the legs of Ryan.
Dundalk could have won it after that with Cleary rattling the crossbar with a header from another Murray delivery before Ryan pulled off a brilliant follow up save to deny Sean Gannon.
Dundalk FC: Rogers; Gannon, Cleary, Hoare, Massey (Oduwa HT); Shields, Mountney (Murray 27); Colovic (Gatt HT), McEleney (Patching 70), Duffy (McMillan HT); Hoban.
Waterford FC: B Murphy (Ryan 43); Bone, Davidson, McCourt; Sobowale, Coote, Weir, Wilson, Smith; Byrne (Fitzgerald 82), O'Connor.
Referee: Ray Matthews (Westmeath).
