O’Neill heads Fingal to Cup glory

A FAIRYTALE ending to a fairy-tale season for Sporting Fingal, as the Dublin newcomers came back from the dead to win the FAI Cup final with an injury time Gary O’Neill header against a Sligo Rovers side which had held the lead in Tallaght with just five minutes to go.

A crowd of 8,000 was in attendance for a terrific game but it was the much smaller support base of Sporting Fingal who stayed on to celebrate as Liam Buckley’s men added the Cup to promotion to the Premier Division in what is just the club’s second year in existence.

In windy conditions on a Tallaght playing surface which was a tribute to the work of the grounds, both sides endeavoured to get the ball down and pass it in the early exchanges.

The left flank proved a promising route for Sligo from the off, with Eoin Doyle feeding the overlapping Joe Kendrick to good effect.

Just past the 20 minute mark, a clever Doyle backheel sent the full-back away again and, from his deep cross, Raffaele Cretaro rose well to head a powerful header just wide of Darren Quigley’s far post.

That was the start of a period of sustained Sligo pressure which kept the Fingal rearguard on their toes but the closest either side came to making a first-half breakthrough was 10 minutes later at the other end when, from a free-kick just outside the corner of the area, Fingal’s Conan Byrne almost caught Ciaran Kelly napping with a low curving shot around the outside of the wall which deflected off the foot of the upright.

That near miss was a signal for the game to suddenly explode into life with ‘keeper Darren Quigley rushing out of his box to deny Sligo dangerman Cretaro and Fingal making two big penalty claims in quick succession, both of them denied.

With the game now having developed a compelling end to end momentum, only a full-blooded block by Lorcan Fitzgerald kept Cretaro’s goal-bound shot at bay before Fingal, in their most freewheeling move so far, saw Shane McFaul, in classic libero style, advancing from deep to penetrate the opposition box where Kelly had to be quick and brave to keep the Sligo goal intact going into the break.

Sligo were first out of the traps after the restart, the impressive Cretaro shooting from distance after a great run by Doyle, before Fingal replied with a fine move which was only stopped by a brilliant Gavin Peers tackle on Loran Fitzgerald.

Minutes later, Cretaro was testing Quigley again but when the keeper spilled the ball Matthew Blinkhorn couldn’t keep his feet in the slippery conditions and the danger was averted. But not for long. Raiding up the right, a devastating Romauld Boco one-two with Blinkhorn opened up the Fingal rearguard, and when Boco pulled the ball back into the centre of the goal it seemed Cretaro must score. But when a great Shaun Maher goal-line block denied him, the striker showed quick-thinking in laying the rebound off to his left where, despite desperate last-ditch Fingal defending, Eoin Doyle was able to squeeze his shot over the line.

The loss of Cretaro to injury with 20 minutes left was a blow to Sligo, although their main priority now was protecting their lead as Fingal threw everything at them in bid to rescue the game. When Eamon Zayed somehow missed from two yards out with just over 10 minutes remaining it looked like their last chance had gone, only for Sligo ‘keeper Ciaran Kelly to take down the striker in the box minutes later.

There was hardly intent in the challenge but the collision left referee Alan Kelly with little option but to award a penalty which, under huge pressure, Colin James dispatched superbly.

And then, in a pulsating end to the game, Zayed saw his looping header cleared off the line by Boco before O’Neill got his head on the end of a superb Robert Bayly cross to find the net in time added on, breaking Sligo hearts and sending Sporting Fingal into raptures, into Europe and into the Irish football history books.

SLIGO ROVERS: Kelly, Boco, Peers, Keane, Kendrick, Cash (Morrison 55), Ventre, Ryan, Doyle, Blinkhorn, Cretaro (Meenan 69).

SPORTING FINGAL: Quigley, James, Maher, Paisley, Fitzgerald, McFaul, Byrne, Bayly, Williams, Zayed, O’ Neill.

Referee: Alan Kelly.