St Loman's edge out Shelmaliers in first round of Leinster club football championship

St Loman's, Mullingar (Westmeath) 1-10 Shelmaliers (Wexford) 1-08

It needed a late goal by corner back Eoghan Hogan to secure a first round win in the Leinster club championship for the local St Loman's side in pleasant conditions in Mullingar, the Lake County representatives having to dig deep to shake off a fit and focused Shelmaliers outfit just a week after their county title win in Wexford.

Shelmaliers had the bulk of the early possession, but they were unable to convert this into scores. They missed three scoreable frees in the opening seven minutes, during which St Loman’s marquee player John Heslin was yellow-carded.

A ninth-minute counter-attack yielded the first score of the game to the always-threatening Shane Dempsey, and it was another six minutes before Heslin doubled the home team’s lead from a 45-metre free. Further points followed from Danny McCartan and Heslin (another free) before Conor Hearne belatedly opened the Wexford champions’ account with a fisted point in the 22nd minute.

Dempsey pounced again in the 26th minute before his opposite number Hearne cancelled this out, moments after a quickfire triple goal chance for the visitors yielded nothing due to solid St Loman’s defending.

A low-trajectory point from Kevin Regan put Paddy Dowdall’s troops ahead by 0-06 to 0-02, but Shelmaliers kept well in touch with a point apiece from the boots of Arnie Murphy and Hearne. Heslin converted his third free of the contest on the stroke of half-time to leave his side with a flattering 0-07 to 0-04 lead at the interval.

Eoin Doyle halved the deficit when he kicked a brace of outstanding points for Ronan Joyce’s charges in the opening eight minutes of the second half. All Star nominee Ronan O’Toole opened his account