Dublin leave Royals off the hook in thriller

DUBLIN and Meath will have to do it all over again after 90 minutes of football failed to separate the old sparring partners in a thrilling O’Byrne Cup tie at Parnell Park yesterday.

A stalemate was the last thing the Leinster Council would have wanted after the cold snap had put the squeeze on their fixture list. With that in mind, the replay has been fixed for Navan on Wednesday evening but it shouldn’t be required at all. The plan was that two more periods of five minutes apiece would be played in the event of a continued stalemate after extra-time but, with spectators streaming on to the pitch, that idea was abandoned.

The thing is, it should have been done and dusted after the 70 minutes when Dublin were leading by a point well into injury-time. Under the new rules, all they had to do was kick to touch and the referee could blow the final whistle.