By full-time, however, it was the natives that were in flying form after securing a result that keeps their dream of a Conference League summer in 2026 alive and puts Shels in a very difficult spot if they want to get back to that stage.<\/p>\n
This was the fifth and final meeting this term of the sides that kicked off the campaign with a President\u2019s Cup victory for the league champions in February.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t a sign of things to come. When it has really mattered, Drogheda have delivered. Kevin Doherty\u2019s charges have collected eight points from a possible 12 against his former club: two wins and two draws. That could be crucial come November; this success moves them back within four points of the European spots, three ahead of Shels, who do have a match in hand.<\/p>\n
They were hanging on at the end, with Harry Wood\u2019s 89th-minute effort meaning that Drogheda had to endure a nervy seven minutes of stoppage time in a game where they ceded possession for long spells. They were clinical at vital moments, though. If defensive stability was the bedrock of Shelbourne\u2019s surprise charge to the title last term, consistent failings in that department are the reason their defence has turned into a fight for a top-four finish. Falling behind when they appeared to be in control just about sums up their season.<\/p>\n
After a Shels attack broke down, Se\u00e1n Gannon cried foul when he went down under an aerial challenge from Dare Kareem, but there was no real stress for the guests when JJ Lunney mopped up and clipped the ball back towards goalkeeper Wessel Speel. However, that was underhit and when Speel changed his decision to come out, Kareem was able to sprint into space and take possession.<\/p>\n
From there, it was all about the Drogheda attacker, who found the top corner with a superb right-footer.<\/p>\n
It was a goal that gave Drogheda a lead to protect, a situation they handled expertly at Tolka Park earlier this season. Shels had started reasonably well with Jack Henry-Francis bright on his first start since his summer move, and Mipo Odubeko was denied from close range by Luke Dennison. It turned out to be the Reds\u2019 best chance of the half.<\/p>\n
With Henry-Francis, Lunney and Harry Wood as a midfield trio behind Se\u00e1n Boyd and Odubeko, Joey O\u2019Brien had good options on the pitch, but Drogheda were composed and they struck when the away boss made a treble switch that withdrew Boyd and Odubeko. From the restart, a free was flicked towards ex-Red Andrew Quinn, whose effort was turned into the net by the covering Evan Caffrey.<\/p>\n
Shels kept going and Drogheda had survived a couple of scrambles before Wood found the target from close range. But it was too little, too late.<\/p>\n
Drogheda United: Dennison, Bolger, Keeley, Quinn; Lambe, Brennan (O\u2019Sullivan 75), Heeney (Markey 62), Cruise (Kane 75); Farrell; Davis (Thomas 62), Kareem (Doyle 70)<\/p>\n
Shelbourne: Speel, Gannon (Coote 65), Barrett, Bone (Ledwidge 45); Mbeng, Lunney, Henry-Francis (McInroy 77), Caffrey; Wood; Boyd (Kelly 65), Odubeko (Martin 65)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By full-time, however, it was the natives that were in flying form after securing a result that keeps…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":37108,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3264,14640,61,60,43,25201],"class_list":["post-37107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-daniel-mcdonnell","tag-drogheda-united-fc","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-shelbourne"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37107","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=37107"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37107\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}