Sligo cruise to Connacht semi-finals as Leitrim fall flat

Sligo claimed a clear-cut win over neighbours Leitrim and a Connacht semi-final place at a windswept Carrick-on-Shannon after a particularly dominant first-half display.

It was a really one-sided encounter in which the wind played havoc for both sides' attempts to play football.

In the circumstances, Sligo, who played with the advantage of the breeze in the opening half, coped much better and forced Leitrim to play second fiddle for most of the game.

Pearce Dolan opened the game's scoring with a 10th-minute Leitrim point. After that Leitrim failed to score for the remainder of the half. It took Sligo another six minutes to get on level terms when Darragh Cummins shot over for the Yeats side.

Niall Murphy put Sligo ahead when he converted a 17th-minute free. After that Sligo played almost all the remainder of the half in Leitrim territory. But the Sligo men found it hard to get on target in the opening 20 minutes of the action as they registered seven wides from mostly long-range efforts.

Sligo's accuracy rate improved greatly in the final 15 minutes of the half after Nathan Mullen fired over on the 20th minute mark. Following that the Yeats men hit five more points without reply from Leitrim.

In this period Niall Murphy shot over from a free and play for Sligo while Canice Mulligan, David Quinn and Paddy O'Connor chipped in with a point each to put the Yeats men ahead by 0-09 to 0-01 at the break.

After the restart, Canice Mulligan extended Sligo's advantage when he fisted over a 40th-minute point. In reply, Leitrim got their first score in 39 minutes when Darragh Rooney split the Sligo posts some eight minutes after Mulligan's score.

Darragh Cummins replied with a Sligo point. After a slight purple patch Leitrim managed to