{"id":439583,"date":"2026-05-09T01:35:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T01:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/439583\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T01:35:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T01:35:08","slug":"saints-turn-on-style-to-deepen-waterfords-blues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/439583\/","title":{"rendered":"Saints turn on style to deepen Waterford&#8217;s blues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A brace from Zack Elbouzedi, a Chris Forrester penalty just before half-time and a 77th-minute goal from Ryan Edmondson gave St Pat&#8217;s a come-from-behind win against Waterford at Richmond Park.<\/p>\n<p>Graham Coughlin&#8217;s first SSE Airtricity Men&#8217;s Premier Division game in charge of Waterford ended in defeat with Stephen Kenny&#8217;s side recovering from falling behind to a John Mahon header after only five minutes.<\/p>\n<p>Forrester\u2019s spot-kick restored parity in the second minute of added time at the end of the opening half and that gave the Saints the impetus going into the second priod.<\/p>\n<p>Aided by a brace from Elbouzedi, the second a beauty from 25 yards, Pat&#8217;s stay second in the table.<\/p>\n<p>The home side made two changes from last week\u2019s draw in Galway, bringing in winger Elbouzedi for Anto Breslin and Darragh Nugent for Jamie Lennon.<\/p>\n<p>The Blues started Northern Irish underage international midfielder Sam Glenfield who scored the winner in the promotion\/relegation playoff against Bray Wanderers at the end of last season. Former Republic of Ireland international defender Kevin Long also got the nod.<\/p>\n<p>Having survived an early Forrester free-kick which whizzed over the Blues crossbar, the away side broke away. Padraig Almond was denied by the legs of Pat&#8217;s keeper Joe Anang. However, from the resultant in-swinging corner, Mahon was free to head past Anang and give Waterford a surprise lead with five minutes played.<\/p>\n<p>It was Lonergan\u2019s sixth of the season, and it came against his former club.<\/p>\n<p>Having conceded early, as they have done a few occasions this season, Pat&#8217;s came mighty close to a 13th-minute equaliser as Kian Leavy worked his way in from the right to lash in a left footer that was just the wrong side of the post.<\/p>\n<p>Waterford soaked up a lot of pressure in the opening half but almost made it 2-0 four minutes before the break as Lonergan danced his way into the area, only to be denied when his goalbound shot was deflected behind for a corner.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Waterford goalkeeper Arlo Doherty is beaten by a penalty from Chris Forrester of St Patrick's Athletic during the SSE Airtricity Men's Premier Division match between St Patrick's Athletic and Waterford at Richmond Park in Dublin. \" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/0024561f-614.jpg\"\/><br \/>\nWaterford goalkeeper Arlo Doherty watches Chris Forrester&#8217;s penalty fly into the net<\/p>\n<p>But the home side were level in first half injury-time after referee Rob Harney adjudged that Barry Baggley was hauled down by Glenfield. Forrester sent Blues keeper Arlo Doherty the wrong way.<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, Forrester almost got a second just after the break as he cut in from the left and his bending effort just flew past the far post.<\/p>\n<p>In the 57th minute, Pat&#8217;s hit the front. James Brown\u2019s right-wing cross was headed on by Forrester and after it ricocheted off defender Jordan Houston, Elbouzedi snuck in at the back post to score.<\/p>\n<p>Elbouzedi then netted his second just after the hour mark. After Leavy\u2019s shot was blocked, the St Pat&#8217;s winger curled a sumptuous effort from distance into the top corner.<\/p>\n<p>The home side got their fourth in the 77th minute as Elbouzedi set up Edmondson in the area and he crashed in his seventh of the season giving St Pat&#8217;s the double over the Blues having won 2-0 at the RSC earlier in the season.<\/p>\n<p>The visitors are now winless in 15 matches and 10 points from the relegation play-off place.<\/p>\n<p>St Patrick&#8217;s Athletic: Joe Anang; Luke Turner, Sean Hoare, Joe Redmond (cap), James Brown; Zack Elbouzedi, Darragh Nugent, Barry Crowe Baggley, Kian Leavy (Jamie Lennon 79) ; Chris Forrester (Romal Palmer 79) ; Ryan Edmondson (Max Mata 79)<\/p>\n<p>Waterford FC: Arlo Doherty; Jordan Houston (Jordan McKenzie Faria 75) , Haydon Cann, John Mahon, Kevin Long, Bernardo Peixoto Couto; Conan Noonan (Jorgen Volias 83), Dean McMenamy (William Johnson 68), Sam Glenfield (Luke Heeney 45); Padraig Amond (capt, Conor Carty 83), Tommy Lonergan<\/p>\n<p>Referee: Rob Harvey<\/p>\n<p>Attendance: 4,132<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A brace from Zack Elbouzedi, a Chris Forrester penalty just before half-time and a 77th-minute goal from Ryan&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":439584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-439583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439583","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=439583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/439584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=439583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=439583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=439583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}