St Patrick's take lucky breaks

St Patrick's Athletic - 1 Bohemians - 0 A performance full of pride, passion and no little incident brought St Patrick's victory…

St Patrick's Athletic - 1 Bohemians - 0 A performance full of pride, passion and no little incident brought St Patrick's victory and with it the prize of jumping four places to second in the Premier Division table.

Jimmi Lee Jones, with the early goal, and goalkeeper Chris Adamson, with a penalty save, were the home heroes in a riveting game, which also saw Bohemians lose Irish international striker Glen Crowe to injury.

It was what those who had long heralded the benefits of summer soccer had in mind as over 4,000 basked in the warmest evening of the year watching an enthralling match.

With their talisman Paul Osam missing from midfield due to a knee injury, St Patrick's had to let Bohemians know they were in a game from the off and they did just that, creating a chance within two minutes and taking the lead six minutes later.

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Charles Mbabazi Livingstone got inside Bobby Ryan down Bohemians' left to signal St Patrick's intent with a stinging shot, which goalkeeper Kelly held.

But Kelly's defence was caught napping for the lead goal minutes later. Adamson launched a long ball that Tony Bird hopefully flicked on. Strike partner Jones nipped in behind a sluggish Bohemians defence and got a touch, and though the ball came back off the outrushing Kelly, it struck Jones again to bounce into the net.

Bohemians were rattled but the champions came back into it and ought to have levelled on 16 minutes. Ken Oman initially had a shot come back off his midfield team-mate Fergal Harkin before Adamson acrobatically touched over a Colin Hawkins header.

Jones used his pace to stretch the Bohemians defence again on 20 minutes but ballooned the ball well over the top.

The fates continued to conspire against Bohemians: they missed a penalty and lost Crowe through injury before half-time.

St Patrick's captain Colm Foley pulled down Paul Keegan on 39 minutes as he attempted to get on the end of Mark Rutherford's diagonal ball. But Adamson dived the right way to hold Harkin's poorly hit penalty.

Crowe was hurt as St Patrick's French left-back, Karim El Khebir, made a superb tackle when the Irish international looked to be in behind the defence from Simon Webb's ball over the top.

Crowe appeared to damage his left knee and limped off to be replaced by Ukrainian Andrei Pereplyotkin.

Bohemians threw everything at St Patrick's from here on, but should have been two down on 52 minutes, when Jones pressured Hawkins into an error and Kelly had to make a superb save.

ST PATRICK'S ATHLETIC: Adamson; Prenderville, Foley, Maguire, El Khebir; Fahy, Murphy (Casey, 80), Donnelly (Marney, 60), Mbabazi; Bird, Jones (Freeman, 71).

BOHEMIANS: Kelly; Lynch, Hawkins, Oman (Morrison, 82), Webb; Ryan, Hunt, Harkin, Rutherford; Keegan (Doyle, 70), Crowe (Pereplyotkin, 44).

Referee: A Kelly (Cork).