oteworthy win away to Fermanagh<\/a>, this 14-point victory consolidates Wexford\u2019s solid start to life back in the division for the first time since 2018 .<\/p>\nIn fact, this was Wexford\u2019s first league success over Laois since 2005, when the Purple and Gold went on to contest the Division 1 decider.<\/p>\n
Such lofty heights are a bit beyond them right now, but Wexford will be further emboldened as they prepare to face fellow promoted outfit Limerick on the road in a fortnight\u2019s time, when Justin McNulty\u2019s Laois will be seeking their first win, at home to Sligo.<\/p>\n
Wexford had suffered a first-round Leinster championship trimming by Laois last summer (2-21 to 2-11), but they were well on the road to revenge in this rematch when leading 0-11 to 0-05 at half-time.<\/p>\n
On a calm evening, wing-back Kevin Swayne and Evan O\u2019Carroll (free) shot the visitors into a 0-02 to 0-01 seventh minute lead.<\/p>\n
But, with Cathal Kehoe having got Wexford off the mark, the hosts led by 0-04 to 0-02 after 11 minutes as Niall Hughes, Tom Byrne and Se\u00e1n Nolan obliged.<\/p>\n
In fact, Nolan was unlucky not to net after intercepting a poor Laois kickout arising from Wexford\u2019s third score.<\/p>\n
And after Rioghan Murphy narrowed the gap, O\u2019Carroll squandered a gilt-edged 16th minute goal chance for Laois after being threaded through by captain Brian Byrne.<\/p>\n
The Hughes cousins, Niall and P\u00e1raic sparked a Wexford purple-patch with a point apiece, while sharpshooter Nolan added a quick four-point burst comprising a 24th minute two-pointer and a brace of frees.<\/p>\n
Jack Higgins stretched the gap to 11-4, before Rioghan Murphy\u2019s third contribution hauled Laois to within six points at the break.<\/p>\n
The home side certainly weren\u2019t resting on their laurels as goalie Brooks added a two-point free four minutes after the restart, before being off-cue from a \u201945 arising from Liam O\u2019Connor forcing a point-black save with a punched effort.<\/p>\n
Conor Heffernan and sub Colin Dunne \u2013 the latter seconds after his introduction \u2013 sought to steady Laois, but Cathal Kehoe and free-taker Nolan quickly reasserted home supremacy after 48 minutes (0-15 to 0-07).<\/p>\n
A further brace of two-pointer frees from Brooks helped consolidate Wexford\u2019s clear-cut victory, their first in seven league attempts against the O\u2019Moore County.<\/p>\n
Wexford: Darragh Brooks (0-07, 3 tpf, 1 \u201945); Gavin Sheehan, Liam O\u2019Connor, Eoin Porter; Glen Malone, Shane Doyle, Dylan Furlong; Liam Coleman, Cathal Kehoe (0-02); Jack Higgins (0-01), P\u00e1raic Hughes (0-01), Mark Rossiter (0-01); Tom Byrne (0-01), Se\u00e1n Nolan (0-07, 1 tp, 3 frees), Niall Hughes (0-02).<\/p>\n
Subs: Robbie Brooks for Nolan (63), Cian Hughes (0-1) for Byrne (63), Colum Feeney for Higgins (66), Cian Ryle for Coffey (68), Se\u00e1n Ryan for N. Hughes (70+3), Se\u00e1n Barden for Malone (70+3).<\/p>\n
Laois: Killian Roche; Trevor Collins, Ben Dempsey, Jack Lacey; Patrick O\u2019Sullivan, Brian Byrne, Kevin Swayne (0-01); Robert Tyrell, Ciar\u00e1n Burke; Niall Corbet, Ronan Coffey, Conor Heffernan (0-01); Rioghan Murphy (0-03), Daragh Galvin (0-01), Evan O\u2019Carroll (0-01 free).<\/p>\n
Subs: Matthew Byron for Roche (HT), Colin Dunne (0-1) for Burke (42), Paul Kingston (0-1) for Corbet (47), Mikie Dempsey for O\u2019Carroll (50).<\/p>\n
Referee: Jonathan Hayes (Limerick).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Goalie Darragh Brooks and sharpshooter Se\u00e1n Nolan each delivered magnificent seven-point hauls as promoted Wexford floored Laois in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":274435,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":{"0":"post-274434","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274434\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/274435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}