Waterford no match for Laois in final league game
Waterford manager Paul Shankey with selector Olan Casey. Photo: Maurice Henebry.
Custer’s Last Stand was not as one sided as this clash at the SETU Arena on Sunday afternoon where Waterford’s Division 4 league campaign ended with a crushing defeat at the hands of a Laois side bent on clinching promotion and erasing the memory of a shock home defeat by Leitrim the previous week.
Securing a first win of a disappointing campaign was always going to be a big ask for Waterford against the league leaders but coming in on the back of some decent recent results Paul Shankey would have been hoping for a performance aimed at building confidence ahead of the April 7th Munster Championship clash with Tipperary. That just did not happen here and now it is a case of the manager getting things back on track over the next two weeks.
Transferred from Fraher Field to the SETU Arena on Friday, this game saw the home support outnumbered by that of the visitors as has been the case in each of Waterford’s home games. From the very outset here it was one way traffic in the direction of the Waterford goal.
It took Laois six minutes to register the opening point of the game but in that period the ball had not left the Waterford half. Corner forward Mark Barry had the opening Laois point and with Laois winning possession and a free from the kick out the ball was sent forward to Barry who turned provider for Evan O’Carroll to shoot to the net. A further minute on and Barry himself had the ball in the net having been put through by Eoin Lowry.
Fielding without regular fullbacks Ross Browne and Liam Fennell Waterford looked very vulnerable at the back as Shaun Fitzpatrick and Paul Kingston added points before Kingston placed Barry for his second goal in the 14th minute.
With Waterford yet to score, or even seriously threaten, Barry followed up with two points before Kingston shot his side’s fourth goal in the 17th minute. With Laois leading by 4-5 to 0-0 the game was effectively over as a contest as Evan O’Carroll shot three more points before Waterford finally got on the scoreboard with Tom O’Connell calling a mark and sending over in the 25th minute.
At that stage of the game Laois manager Justin McNulty had turned his attention to the upcoming Divisional final and decided to call his top scorers ashore so we saw the departure of Mark Barry and Evan O’Carroll. Waterford were given some little respite with Tom O’Connell sending over a free after he had been fouled before Jason Curry followed up with a point in the 33rd minute. Laois completed the first half scoring with a point from free by sub Rioghan Murphy to take an unflattering eighteen point lead into the second half. H.T. Laois 4-9 Waterford 0-3.
Like Laois, Waterford may have had their upcoming championship game in mind given some of their halftime substitutions that saw Dermot Ryan and Tom O’Connell called ashore as well as Willie Beresford. Aaron Beresford replaced Paudie Hunt in goal though the Rathgormack keeper could hardly be blamed for any of the scores that beat him. Laois made two further substitutions.
With the Laois changes the scoring rate dropped with sub Brian Daly shooting the first Laois point of the second half before Stephen Curry had Waterford’s fourth point from a mark in the 40th minute. It seemed like normal service was about to be resumed when Rioghan Murphy raced through to score his side’s fifth goal in the 41st minute. Donie Fitzgerald intervened with a Waterford point but two points from Kingston and one from Niall Dunne had Waterford twenty three points behind with just 45 minutes played.
To their credit Waterford never threw in the towel and kept battling on to the bitter end, adding four further points, one from Donie Fitzgerald and three from Jason Curry frees to Laois’ five. The Laois supporters were leaving for home before the final whistle waiting to see who their opponents would be in the Division 4 final and that turned out to be against Leitrim, the only side to have beaten them and who edged out Wexford.
It was a game in which nothing went right for Waterford against opponents who were always going to have but a short stay in Division 4. No one played to his potential and now it is a case of regrouping for the game against Tipperary, the team they came closest to beating in the league.
– Mark Barry 2-3, Evan O’Connell and Paul Kingston 1-3 each, Rioghan Murphy 1-1, Eoin Lowry (Fs) and Killian Roche (F, ‘45) 0-2 each, Brian Daly, Niall Dunne and Conor Heffernan 0-1 each.
– Jason Curry 0-4 (3Fs), Tom O’Connell (1F, 1 M) and Donie Fitzgerald 0-2 each, Stephen Curry 0-1 (M).
– Killian Roche, Ben Dempsey, Seamus Lacey, Jack Lacey, Eoin Buggie, Mark Timmons, Brian Byrne, Kieran Lillis, Damon Larkin, Kevin Swayne, Eoin Lowry, Shaun Fitzpatrick, Mark Barry, Evan O’Carroll, Paul Kingston. – Rioghan Murphy for Barry and Brian Daly for O’Carroll (25), Niall Dunne for Fitzpatrick and Simon Fingleton for Timmons (HT), Conor Heffernan for Lillis (52).
– Paudie Hunt (Rathgormack), Conor McCarthy (Ballinacourty), Caomhin Walsh (Kilrossanty), Conor O’Cuirin (An Rinn), Michael Mullaney (Stradbally), Dermot Ryan (Nire), Robbie McGrath (Ballinameela), Michael Curry (Rathgormack), Jason Curry (Rathgormack), James Power (Rathgormack), Stephen Curry (Rathgormack), Billy O’Keeffe (Gaultier), Willie Beresford (Ballinacourty), Tom O’Connell (Brickeys), Alan Dunwoody (Kilrossanty). Subs – Aaron Beresford (Ballinacourty) for Hunt, Donie Fitzgerald (Kilrossanty) for Ryan, James Walsh (Modeligo) for O’Connell and Billy Hynes (Shamrocks) for Beresford (all HT), James Keane (Ardmore) for Mullaney.
– David Hickey (Carlow).
