Waterford put the brakes on London’s progress

THE Sky Sports cameras were at Ruislip on Saturday but they didn’t get the result they were hoping for. In what they described ‘Gaelic football’s version of the FA Cup’, this was one giantkilling act too many for London.

Such was the pre-match fervour surrounding the Exiles, Waterford travelled over to the English capital practically unnoticed, and it played perfectly into their hands. Physically imposing and clinical in attack, the visitors struck an early goal through colossal full-forward Gary Hurney and never looked back.

Waterford’s cause was certainly helped by London, who had key forward Paul Geraghty and Ciarán McCallion both dismissed either side of half-time.

It meant Paul Coggins’ side couldn’t use the wind as efficiently as they did against both Mayo and Fermanagh as Waterford were content to entice London upfield before launching vigorous counter-attacks.

The win — Waterford’s first in the qualifiers — was a welcome relief for John Owens.

The Déise manager looked to have a difficult task in lifting his side following last month’s 18-point demolition by All-Ireland champions Cork, but he revealed after the final whistle that there was no shortage of motivation among his players, due to the absence of one of their teammates.

“We have a man at home, Tommy Prendergast, who played for us all through the league and against Cork,” explained Owens.

“He’s in Waterford Regional Hospital and is going to be for another wee while. He’s only a young fella, 22, but he’s six foot five and his heart is nearly bigger than this team. We had to leave him at home, but it helped push us on. At the start of the match and at half time we mentioned his name and you could see fellas responding to it. It helped galvanise the team, especially his own club-mate Paul Whyte, who kicked some great scores.”

Wing-forward Whyte was in outstanding form, kicking a wonderful array of scores from both frees and open play. The Kilrossanty man finished with seven points to his credit, while full-forward Hurney chipped in with 1-3, his sheer bulk causing Kerry full-back Michael Moloney problems.

“They’ve been threatening (to produce that),” said Owens. “Paul is a quality young fella; his father was a great footballer. Gary is only getting his fitness back but he’s a handful. But they got great support from other players. Sean Fleming was up and down the sideline, winning ball when he shouldn’t be able to. There was a great overall performance. I know London lost two men but all through the league we were looking for a few decisions or results to go our way. We lost three matches by two points so it’s nice to some bit of good fortune.”

That turn of luck began with the toss, which Waterford won and therefore prevented London from playing with the strong wind in the first half, a strategy they have used to great effect this summer. And although London were off the mark inside 30 seconds, Waterford silenced the 3,000-strong crowd moments later with the game’s only goal.

It came in fortunate circumstances. Fleming intercepted a poor sideline kick from Derek Hagan and took off up the wing. His attempt came off the post and into the grateful arms of Hurney, who made no mistake from close range.

The remainder of the half belonged to Waterford, who punished London’s unforced errors with score after score. Six points were registered before London ended 20 minutes without a score through a Padraig McGoldrick free.

A well-worked point from the excellent Tony Gaughan gave London hope heading into the break, but they were then rocked when Geraghty picked up a second yellow and subsequent red for an alleged punch.

Down to 14 men and trailing by 1-10 to 0-5 at the interval, London faced a huge task to record back-to-back championship victories for the first time. And although they started the second half positively, Eoin O’Neill (2) and Gaughan reducing arrears to six points, their hopes were all but ended when McCallion was given his marching orders by referee Syl Doyle for a reckless lunge.

To their credit London battled on and knocked over some fine scores, but such was Waterford’s numerical advantage, they were capable of issuing an immediate reply, and ran out comfortable seven-point winners.

“It’s great to win,” said Owens. “We’ve been on a very bad run and had to get our heads out of the sands after the Cork game. London losing two men made our job that bit easier. They have had a good run but we’d be hoping we can do something similar. We didn’t become a bad team overnight and had a couple of close runs in the league.

“It didn’t happen against Cork; we let a lot of people down, ourselves mainly.

“But we’ve had a couple of challenge games recently against Leitrim and Limerick, and that helped us today.”

Scorers for Waterford: P Whyte 0-7 (4f); G Hurney 1-3; W Hennessy 0-3; S Fleming, B Wall 0-2 each.

Scorers for London: E O’Neill (3f), T Gaughan 0-3 each; K Phair 0-2f; P Geraghty, S McVeigh, P McGoldrick (f), M Gottsche (’45), S Kelly (f) 0-1 each.

Subs for Waterford: C Phelan for Walsh (half-time); JJ Hutchinson for P Hurney (52); B Phelan for Dempsey (58); J Phelan for Grey (61); C McGrath for Wall (61).

Subs for London: S Browne for Hagan (27); K Phair (0-2f) for McGoldrick (44); S Kelly (0-1f) for Comer (52); C O’Sullivan for O’Neill (59); J Collins for McVeigh (65).

Referee: S Doyle (Wexford)