Mountney strikes late to grab precious points for Dundalk

Sean Kavanagh of Shamrock Rovers in action against Zak Bradshaw of Dundalk during the SSE Airtricity Men’s Premier Division match between Dundalk and Shamrock Rovers at Oriel Park in Dundalk, Louth. Pic: Ramsey Cardy, Sportsfile

Premier Division: Dundalk 1 Shamrock Rovers 0

Captain John Mountney led by example as he struck a 91st-minute winner to earn Dundalk a huge victory over Shamrock Rovers in their battle to avoid the drop.

The 31-year-old fired past Leon Pohls with his side first attempt on target of the night to close the gap at the bottom of the table to just three points following Drogheda Utd’s dramatic late collapse at home to Galway Utd.

The winning goal, Mountney’s first at Oriel Park in five years, marked a brilliant end to a week of upheavel at the Co Louth side with both Head of Football Operations Brian Gartland and manager Noel King departing, the latter on health grounds.

This result will give the Lilywhites hope of avoiding the drop for as well as being their second win of the campaign, it was also a sixth successive clean sheet at home - a feat not achieved since by them since the start of the 2015 season.

While there were celebrations for the hosts,
it was a hugely disappointing night for Shamrock Rovers who lost further ground in the SSE Airtricity Men’s Premier Division title race.

Stephen Bradley’s side were late arriving at Oriel and never really got going on a night when the two sides above them, Shelbourne and Derry City, both won.

They are now six points shy of Damien Duff’s tabletoppers with the Hoops on a run of just one win in their last seven — a worrying trend ahead of their match at home to second-placed Derry City on Monday.

The kick-off at Oriel Park was delayed by half an hour due to the Rovers kit not arriving on time as a result of the traffic delays caused by the seven hour closure of the M50 earlier in the day due to a fatal road traffic accident.

The game then took a while to get going also with the first and only effort on target in the opening half arriving on 17 minutes when Ross Munro easily kept out Johnny Kenny’s effort at his near post.

The home side went in search of a lead goal on the restart with Paul Doyle going closest when he curled an effort about an inch the wrong side of the left hand on 53 minutes.

Substitute Graham Burke screwed Rovers’ best opening wide after being teed up by Neil Farrugia on 72 minutes but it looked like the game was petering out for a draw until Mountney popped up with a first-time finish past Pohls in stoppage time to earn a huge win for Liam Burns’ side.

DUNDALK: Munro; Johnson, Boyle, Animasahun; Davies, Bradshaw, Doyle (Muller 74), Mountney; Horgan, Gullan, Elliott (Durrant 67).

SHAMROCK ROVERS: Pohls; Cleary, Lopes, Honohan; Nugent, Kavanagh (McEneff 74), Noonan (Farrugia 66), Byrne, Clarke; Greene, Kenny (Burke 66).

Referee: Alan Patchell (Dublin).