Armagh march past dour Derry

SPARE a thought for Gerard O’Kane today.

With six minutes to play and the home side trailing by four points, Armagh goalkeeper Paul Hearty batted away the Derry skipper’s tame penalty and, with it, their dwindling hopes of victory.

That they eventually lost by three points will highlight the magnitude of the wing-back’s miss all the more but his manager Damien Cassidy absolved him of any blame afterwards.

And rightly so.

Derry were awful yesterday and O’Kane’s effort was merely indicative of a side that fell down the Division One plughole last month after a decade of comparable disappointments in the championship.

How bad were they?

Well, they only scored three times from play, managed just two scores in total in the second half and got exactly what they deserved from the day, which was nothing.

Time and again they threw themselves at Armagh’s defensive wall but it was like watching a fly hurl itself at a pane of glass and they will need to do some serious thinking ahead of their by now familiar diversion into the qualifiers.

Armagh, as Paddy O’Rourke admitted, were far from stellar, but they were able to raise themselves sufficiently when faced with adversity and their dominance in the spell either side of the interval guided them safely home. Derry’s scalp isn’t the prize it used to be but this was, nevertheless, the first time anyone has bettered them in the championship in the tight confines of Celtic Park since Down conquered Foyleside in 1994.

As statistics go, that isn’t to be sniffed at but if this tie is remembered for anything in time to come –– and that is debatable – it will be for the 69 frees referee Maurice Deegan awarded.

Tactics were complicit in the lack of excitement. Forget the team sheets listed below. The 3-3-2-3-3 formation is as outdated as catch-and-kick and modern football doesn’t feel bound by its archaic constraints.

Both sides fielded four half-backs with O’Kane and Ciaran McKeever operating as sweepers in between their defensive lines and the result was a cagey and forgettable affair.

The premium on space and skill was such that it took Paddy Bradley 29 minutes to score from play, Steven McDonnell 35, while the game’s other billboard attacker, Eoin Bradley, had to wait until nine minutes after the restart.

That said, Armagh were denied two possible goals in the opening 23 minutes with Barry Gillis saving from Brian Mallon in the opening seconds and a possible penalty for a foul on James Lavery being waved away.

It fell to Derry to land the first major blow soon after.

Mark Lynch thundered purposefully down the middle, fed an overlapping Fergal Doherty on the right and the midfielder’s ball across the penalty box was directed to the net by Paddy Bradley’s flying fist.

Armagh’s response was clinical. At that point, neither side had managed to string two consecutive scores but Armagh managed five on the trot in the aftermath of Bradley’s strike.

McDonnell was still being well marshalled by Dermot McBride at that stage but the visitors’ chief offensive weapon hit two superb frees and tacked on his only score from play before the rush for the oranges.

Charlie Vernon and Ryan Henderson added to that haul on the restart before a reply from Eoin Bradley marked the onset of a scoreless 10 minutes that ended in disastrous fashion for the home side.

Derry had already spurned a couple of handy chances to regain parity on the scoreboard when they went a man down after 54 minutes. Eoin Bradley was the offender, walking for a second yellow card offence.

Cruelly, one sucker punch was swiftly followed by another. Within 60 seconds the ball was in Barry Gillis’s net courtesy of a pinpoint ball over the top from McDonnell and a cool finish by substitute Jamie Clarke.

That made the margin four points which, in a game like this, was a significant buffer but Derry looked like they might bridge it when Finian Moriarty careered into Paddy Bradley inside the area after 64 minutes.

It wasn’t to be, Lynch ended the scoring with an injury-time free but all the drama and suspense drained away from the ground, along with most of the home support, as soon as Hearty made his definitive intervention.

Armagh: P Hearty; A Mallon, K Toner, B Donaghy; P Duffy, C McKeever, F Moriarty; C Vernon (0-1), J Lavery; M Mackin, A Kernan (0-3), G Swift; B Mallon, S McDonnell (0-5), R Henderson (0-1).

Subs: V Martin, J Clarke (0-1), K Dyas.

Derry: B Gillis; B Og McAlary, K McGuckin, D McBride; G O'Kane, B McGuigan, M Bateson; F Doherty, Patsy Bradley; SL McGoldrick, M Lynch (0-2), D Mullan; Paddy Bradley (1-2), E Bradley (0-1), R Wilkinson.

Subs: B McGoldrick, J Kielt, M Craig, J Diver, E Muldoon.

Referee: M Deegan (Laois).