![\"Kildare's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/0023e52f-614.jpg\"\/)
\nKildare’s Neil Flynn kicks a point despite the attention of Derry defender Gareth McKinless<\/p>\n
Despite the sixth minute sending off of captain and talisman Conor Glass, Derry recorded a superb win in Cedral St Conleth’s Park in an incident-packed game.<\/p>\n
Glass’ dismissal for an off the ball clash with Callum Bolton was just the start of the action in horrendous conditions and Derry had a nine-minute spell in the first half with just 12 players on the field.<\/p>\n
Kildare led by five early in the second half but the game swung on two goals inside 60 seconds in the 38th minute, the first of those an absolute wondergoal by Paul Cassidy.<\/p>\n
That goal was followed by a more mundane close-range effort by Lachlan Murray and once in front, Derry didn\u2019t relinquish their lead.<\/p>\n
Derry had started well and had three points on the board inside the opening 90 seconds but after Glass\u2019 dismissal, Kildare got on top and led 0-04 to 0-03.<\/p>\n
The excellent Shane McGuigan scored a two-pointer and then a 16th-minute goal, but Derry didn\u2019t score in the remainder of the half despite having the advantage of a strong wind.<\/p>\n
After Niall Loughlin was shown a black card in the 23rd minute, there was another flashpoint shortly after that ended with a red for Kildare\u2019s Alex Beirne and a black for Conor Doherty to make it 14 against 12.<\/p>\n
Led by the superb Ben Loakman, who scored four points in the first half and finished with ten in all, Kildare fought back and edged their way in front and eventually led 1-10 to 1-06 at the break following a fortunate 33rd-minute goal by Brian McLoughlin.<\/p>\n
A Loakman free early in the second half put Kildare five clear but the game swung on Cassidy\u2019s brilliant strike. He ran from almost the halfway line and while Kildare were slow to get a hand on him, he kept going and in the end fired a rocket of a shot into the top corner.<\/p>\n
Half-time substitute Matthew Downey teed up Murray less than a minute later and there were further points from McGuigan and Murray as they scored 2-02 in a decisive spell.<\/p>\n
\nKildare’s Neil Flynn kicks a point despite the attention of Derry defender Gareth McKinless<\/p>\n
Two Loakman two-pointers in the second half twice got Kildare back to within a point but every time the home side got within touching distance, Derry were able to come down and reply with a point of their own.<\/p>\n
In the end, a game that was played at a frantic pace in pouring rain, sleet and snow for 65 minutes fizzled out as Derry methodically saw out the game by keeping possession against a tiring Kildare.<\/p>\n
After waiting so long for a win before their second round victory over Tyrone, the manner of this one meant the final hooter was greeted with huge cheers from the sizeable travelling Derry support as their management team and players celebrated on the pitch.<\/p>\n
Kildare: Cian Burke; Harry O’Neill, Padraic Spillane, Ryan Burke; James Harris, Eoin Lawlor, Brian Byrne; Kevin Feely, Brendan Gibbons; Brian McLoughlin (1-02), Callum Bolton (0-02), Colm Moran (0-01); Ben Loakman (0-10, 2tp, 2fs), Alex Beirne, Eoin Cully (0-02).<\/p>\n
Subs: Darragh Kirwan for Moran (43), Jack McKevitt for Harris (48), Sam Doran for Feely (590, Neil Flynn (0-01) for McLoughlin (58), James McGrath for O’Neill (65).<\/p>\n
Derry: Shea McGuckin; Diarmuid Baker, Ruairi Forbes, Sean Young; Conor Doherty (0-03, 1tp), Gareth McKinless, Padraig McGrogan; Conor Glass, Brendan Rogers; Ethan Doherty, Shea Downey, Paul Cassidy (1-00); Niall Loughlin (0-03), Shane McGuigan (1-05, 1tp, 1f), Lachlan Murray (1-03).<\/p>\n
Subs: Matthew Downey (0-01) for Young (ht), Niall Toner for S Downey (54), Conor McAteer for Loughlin (66).<\/p>\n
Referee: David Gough (Meath).<\/p>\n
Watch Allianz League Sunday from 9.35pm on RT\u00c92 and RT\u00c9 Player. Follow a live blog on all matches on the RT\u00c9 News App and on rte.ie\/sport. Listen to Sunday Sport on RT\u00c9 Radio 1<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite the sixth minute sending off of captain and talisman Conor Glass, Derry recorded a superb win in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":298549,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-298548","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298548","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=298548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298548\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/298549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=298548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=298548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=298548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}