Hughes’ strike takes pressure off Gill as Dundalk get off mark

Dundalk 1 Galway Utd 0

The Louth club had lost their opening four games of the season and pressure was mounting on new manager John Gill to pick up his first win since taking over.

The former Dublin City boss duly delivered as his side completely outplayed the visitors from start to finish, as the Terryland Park outfit failed to register a shot on target for the entire 90 minutes.

The match-winning goal came two minutes into stoppage time at the end of the first half when man-of-the-match Philip Hughes shrugged off the challenge of Ronan Frawley to rifle past Alan Gough. Five minutes beforehand, the former Monaghan Utd striker was denied when Alan Keane hooked off the line with Galway’s Philip Reilly also firing inches wide before the break after an attempted lob of Neil Gallagher.

That would prove to be the visitors’ best chance of the half as Dundalk went on to completely dominate the second half.

Hughes and Peter Hynes both saw 30-yard efforts flash narrowly the wrong side of the post early on while the former was denied a second goal on 57 minutes when he blazed over from four yards out when it looked easier to score. A second goal would have been no more than Dundalk deserved but they will be thankful to have finally got their season off the ground.

DUNDALK: Gallagher; Hudson, Kelly, Griffin, McAuley; Hoey, Dunne, Flanagan, Marney, Hynes (Vaughan, 71 mins), Hughes (Skelly, 80 mins).

GALWAY UTD: Gough; Keady, Clery (Carter, 67 mins), Frawley, Keane; Cretaro, Foley, Harty (O’Brien, half-time), Rojas (Dowd); Reilly, Murphy.

Referee: D Tomley (Dublin).

SHELBOURNE have been fined €5,000 by the Setanta Cup Organising Committee for lack of co-operation with Setanta Sports earlier in the tournament.

It is understood that there were difficulties with arrangements regarding pre-match and post-match interviews.

Providing Shelbourne do not break the TV rules again, the fine will be reduced to €2,000.

Meanwhile Drogheda United have failed in their bid to register another goalkeeper for the Setanta tournament. Regular first choice keeper Dan Connor is suspended for Tuesday’s clash with Linfield after being red-carded in the 2-0 home defeat by Cork City last week.

Charlie Treacy, aged 20, is expected to recover from injury to take his place for Paul Doolin’s side against Linfield in Belfast.