St Loman's retain Westmeath crown after penalty shootout win over The Downs

St Loman's, Mullingar 1-15 The Downs 2-12
St Loman's won 3-0 on penalties after extra-time

It needed a penalty shootout for St Loman’s to retain their Westmeath senior football crown in ideal conditions in Mullingar.

After a cagey opening, Shane Dempsey, who had missed the epic drawn game six days earlier due to injury, opened the scoring with a well-taken goal for the holders in the seventh minute, getting on the end of a probing delivery by Danny McCartan.

This proved to be the difference between the teams at half-time, St Loman’s ahead by 1-05 to 0-05, with three of The Downs’ scores having come from their mercurial skipper Luke Loughlin, one each from play, a mark and a free.

Andrew Kilmartin and Danny McCartan traded points shortly after play resumed before Loughlin superbly converted from the spot after a foul on Niall Mitchell, to level the scoring.

There was very little between the teams as the second half progressed, with Loughlin leading the way for The Downs with a couple of marvellous points.

Joe Moran's great block as Ronan O'Toole looked set to find the net in the 57th minute kept the 2022 champions' hopes alive, and corner-back Eanna Burke almost won the day for them with seconds left in injury-time as his shot dropped agonisingly short. The teams remained tied at 1-10 each, thereby ensuing extra-time.

St Loman's were leading by 1-12 to 1-10 when Ian Martin found the net to nudge his team ahead eight minutes into the first period of extra-time.

The outstanding Kelvin Reilly and sub Matthew Cunningham traded points, leaving The Downs up by 2-11 to 1-13 at the end of the first period of extra-time. In the second period, Heslin and Mitchell swapped points from frees, but O’Toole’s fine score brought the game to