Downey stars as Louth clinch Division 2 safety with win over Cavan

Ciaran Downey of Louth in action against Niall Carolan of Cavann. Pic: Ben McShane/Sportsfile

Division 2: Cavan 1-12 Louth 1-22 

Louth guaranteed themselves safety in Division Two and at the same time sent hosts Cavan closer to the relegation trap door.

The visitors were outstanding and actually led by 1-18 to 0-6 with over half an hour yet to play.

Brian O'Connell had put the hosts in front by the odd point in three in the 2nd minute, but that was as good as it got for them as a nightmare scenario slowly unfurled itself.

The visitors posted notice of their intent by engineering a major goal chance after just 52 seconds but Cavan 'keeper Brady brilliantly deflected the ball over the bar from Ryan Burns' piledriver.

Safe as a house at the back, majestic under the high ball in the middle and razor-sharp up front, Louth blossomed under the lights and their early deficit morphed into a 0-10 to 0-2 lead by the 18th minute.

Cavan's think-tank took major remedial action to stem the bleeding with talisman Gearóid McKiernan coming in for late call-up Eoin Clarke.

Cavan belatedly began to show a bit of bite for the fight and McKiernan set up Gerry Smith and McVeety for a point apiece to steady the blue and white ship.

Louth's first goal in the 28th minute was a thing of beauty. Two outside-of-foot 40-yard passes from 'keeper McDonnell and Mulroy saw the latter feed Ryan Burns, and in a jiffy, Burns' slide-rule pass was clinically finished to the net, soccer-style, by Ciaran Downey.

Louth added to their massive 1-16 to 0-6 interval lead by drawing first blood on the restart into the teeth of the wind with McDonnell and Burns splitting the posts.

But, arguably worse still for the fans with a blue hue, their charges’ heads seemed to go down under the weight of their opponents’ consistent assault.

Cavan got a momentary reprieve in the 45th minute when Conal McKeever and Kieran McArdle saw their shots from point-blank range both parried on the goal-line.

Seconds after coming onto the field, Galway-based sub. Ciarán Brady palmed the ball to the Louth net to reduce the hosts' deficit to 15 points with 20 minutes left to play but it was to be a false dawn for the homesters.

Cavan did lay siege to the Louth goal in the dregs of the game and Dara McVeety and Tiarnan Madden were unlucky not to find the net on each occasion but it was a classic case of too little too late.

Cavan: L Brady; J McLoughlin, P Meade, B O’Connell (0-1); O Brady, E Clarke, G Smith (0-1); R Brady (0-1), Conor Brady; Ciarán Brady (Arva), Cormac Brady, P Corrigan; C Shekleton (0-2), P Lynch (0-4, '45, 1f, 2ptr), D McVeety (0-1).

Subs: G McKiernan (0-2, 2f) for E Clarke (15); N Carolan for R Brady (h-t); Ciarán Brady (1-0) for G Smith (48); T Madden for C Brady (Arva, 48); T Smith for N Carolan (69).

Louth: N McDonnell; P Tinnelly, D Campbell, C McKeever; T McDonnell (0-3, tptr), E Carolan, C Lennon; D McDonnell, C Early; P Matthews (0-3, tptr), S Mulroy (0-5, 3f, 2ptr), C Grimes (0-1); K McArdle (0-1), C Downey (1-4), R Burns (0-5, 2ptr).

Subs: C Keenan for R Burns (inj, 43), E Callaghan for C McKeever (54); D Nally for T McDonnell (61); T Durnin for P Matthews (64); J Maguire for K McArdle (69).

Ref: P Faloon (Down).