Controversy as Drogs deny nine-man Dundalk

Drogheda United 1 Dundalk 0

The Lilywhites, with only faint hopes now of capturing the league title, look set to end the season trophy-less after having Chris Shields and Darren Meenan controversially sent off to leave their team to battle with nine men for an entire hour.

Stephen Kenny and members of his management team tried to confront referee Anthony Buttimer at half-time after the two key decisions which were hugely controversial and both assistant boss Vinny Perth and fitness coach Graham Byrne were dismissed during the interval.

It started from nothing. First, Darren Meenan was given his marching orders for a tackle that appeared to merit a yellow card at most, and hardly had Dundalk’s anger begun to wane when Chris Shields tripped Declan O’Brien from behind in the penalty area and was dismissed, even though there seemed to be a covering defender.

Brennan duly converted the spot-kick.

But Dundalk weren’t going to throw in the towel and they defended resolutely in the second half against a Drogheda side which seemed uncertain how to approach the game.

Other than a driven shot to the near post by Gavin Brennan which Cherrie pushed away for a corner, the Lilywhites didn’t look like conceding until huge gaps began to appear in the closing 10 minutes.

Dundalk sub Tiarnan Mulvenna had a great chance to level on 85 minutes when he burst clear of Alan McNally and drew a great save.

But a minute later it was Cherrie performing heroics to keep out a Grimes piledriver as Drogheda held out.

DROGHEDA UNITED: Schlingermann; Daly, McNally, Prendergast, Grimes; Byrne; Cassidy, O’Conor (Hynes, 61), R Brennan, G Brennan; O’Brien.

DUNDALK: Cherrie; Sullivan (Faherty, 75), Gartland, Boyle, Massey; Meenan, Shields, Towell, O’Donnell; Hoban (Mountney, 38), Byrne (Mulvenna, 66).

Referee: Anthony Buttimer (Cork).