By Mike Fitzpatrick
Stamford 1-13, Westmeath 1-7
Stamford’s journey to Gaelic Park on Sunday last was certainly worth it, as the Connecticut men left with another two precious championship points in the bag after defeating Westmeath 1-13 to 1-7 in this Senior Football Div. 1 clash.
Both sides needed the victory but having already dropped points in their loss to Cavan, then drawing with Leitrim, Westmeath were in more dire need of winning this clash. Without the highly influential Brian McCabe, Westmeath were missing one of their best players, so things did not look good for John Moore’s men.
And so a jumbled Westmeath formation, hit by injuries and various players unavailable for selection, took the field and it was perhaps because of this that Westmeath struggled to find their feet in the early stages of the game.
Stamford, one of the perennial dark horses for the championship, opened strongly, and despite a number of misses throughout the half, they still entered the break on the upper hand.
Never miss an issue of The Irish Echo
Subscribe to one of our great value packages.
With Davie Phelan’s goal separating the sides, it should certainly have been more but for a number of efforts sailing wide of the posts.
Westmeath had their chances too, and scored some fine first-half points from Ollie Gaughan and Neil McSherry.
After the break, both sides found something of the flow that was so obviously missing from the first half performance, and Westmeath began to climb back a little. Neil McSherry hit a fine goal in for Westmeath, and a point from Barney Healy moved them into the slenderest of leads for the first time in the second half.
Westmeath looked set to pull off something of a surprise victory, but Stamford immediately hit back. Evan Kelly capped a fine personal performance with another two points, to push Stamford back in front, and a defensive lapse on behalf of the Westmeath backline, gave Davie Phelan the chance to push his side ahead with a lead Westmeath were incapable of catching at such a late stage. Phelan did not let his team down, and fired the ball past Kevin Wilson in the Westmeath goal to give the Connecticut men a fine six point victory.
Westmeath: Kevin Wilson, Ciaran Walsh (0-1), Davie Bailey, Collie Mathers, Ciaran Ryan (0-1), Brendan Kearney, James Kavanagh, Neil McSherry(1-0), Barney Healy (0-2), Tom Quinn, Jimmy Hughes, Ollie Gaughran (0-3), Frank Kavanagh, Brian Newman. Subs Peter Dalton, Pat Spellman.
Stamford: James McAlarey, Ronan O’Connor, Phil Wickham, Tony Power, Pat Coyne, Richie Purcell (0-1), Mark Comerford, Keith Hennessy, Paul Galvin (0-1), Justin O’Halloran, Evan Kelly (0-5), Adrian Kearney (0-2), Mike Martin, Davie Phelan (1-2), Declan Curtin, Sub: Terry Mannion (0-2).