Rovers rescue a late point at home to Galway

Johnny Kenny salvaged a point for Shamrock Rovers with a late equaliser as they were made to work extremely hard for a share of the spoils by a tenacious Galway United at Tallaght Stadium.

Trailing to Stephen Walsh's 55th minute lead, Rovers huffed and puffed before levelling on 84 minutes.

Dylan Watts whipped over their umpteenth corner of the night.

Substitute Kenny out jumped Walsh to head to the top corner despite Brendan Clarke, who had earlier saved a penalty from Watts, getting a hand to the ball.

The champions drop a place to third in the table, five points behind leaders Shelbourne, though with a game in hand as Galway remain fifth.

Adding to injury-hit Rovers' selection issues was a suspension for defender Dan Cleary who had featured in every game previously this season.

Sean Kavanagh thus slotted in on the left of Hoops’ back three.

Aaron Greene and Rory Gaffney came in from the start, both having been sprung from the bench in Monday’s 0-0 draw at Shelbourne.

A Rovers bench here including no fewer than seven teenagers.

Galway manager John Caulfield watched from the stand as he serves a two-match suspension, his well-organised side frustrating Rovers throughout the first half.

Goal-shy Galway have scored just seven goals all season, and now only three in their last nine games.

But their defensive stubbornness in having kept six clean sheets from 11 before visiting Dublin 24 was evident.

It was the 22nd minute before Hoops created the game’s first clear opening.

Darragh Burns picked out Greene who turned to lay the ball into the path of Darragh Nugent who got right under his shot to balloon it over Clarke’s crossbar.

Lively and inventive, Burns was Rovers’ chief foil, the MK Dons loanee mesmerising Ed McCarthy to make room