UCD’s safe passage to Sunday\u2019s First Division play-off final was never in doubt as they eased past Longford Town at the UCD Bowl.<\/p>\n
Already 2-0 up after the first-leg, College barely broke sweat as goals in each half from Mikey McCullagh and Hugh Smith completed a straightforward victory that will keep their season alive for another game at least.<\/p>\n
The Students will face Bray Wanderers in Sunday\u2019s division final at Tolka Park (3.00pm) with the winner progressing to face the ninth-placed team in the Premier Division – currently Drogheda United – for the right to play in the top flight next season.<\/p>\n
The onus was on Longford to come out fighting, but they never looked capable of inflicting the sort of damage needed to get themselves back into this tie.<\/p>\n
Darragh Murtagh was put through early on but his shot from a decent position in the box clipped defender Harry Curtis and went out for a corner.<\/p>\n
Murtagh then fizzed another effort over the crossbar from further out but Longford’s attacking play lacked conviction when it mattered – and UCD showed their First Division rivals how to pack a punch with the lead goal after 19 minutes.<\/p>\n
Sean Murphy took a throw-in from under the stand that was quickly headed back to him. He clipped an early cross into the box for McCullagh to expertly sweep home first-time with his left-foot.<\/p>\n
It was a brilliantly taken goal by McCullagh and, added to Louis Dignam and Smith\u2019s first-leg strikes, it was hard to see any way back for Longford who huffed and puffed to half-time with Andy Paraschiv\u2019s scruffy shot never threatening.<\/p>\n
UCD just had more purpose to their attacks and Luca Cailloce skimmed the crossbar with an angled shot before Sam Norval put the ball on a plate for Smith but, at full stretch, he couldn\u2019t connect from close range.<\/p>\n
But never mind, he was merely conserving energy for the run and finish he provided for UCD\u2019s second goal – 12 minutes into the second-half – that buried Longford once and for all.<\/p>\n
Clearing his lines, College defender Carl Lennox pumped a long ball towards Smith, which he collected inside his own half. But he quickly set off on a purposeful run and held off Paraschiv who was tracking back, before finishing low and left-footed.<\/p>\n
UCD could have won by more in injury-time but Longford goalkeeper Kian Moore pulled off a flying save to deny substitute Stephen Mohan when he attempted to bend a shot high into the corner of the net.<\/p>\n
UCD: Dara Kavanagh; Sean Murphy (Adam Wells 73), Luca Cailloce, Carl Lennox, Harry Curtis; Mikey McCullagh (Matthew Alonge 79), Louis Dignam, Jayden Goad (Tom Morley 68), Ciaran Behan (Charles Akinrintayo 73; Hugh Smith (Stephen Mohan 68), Sam Norval.<\/p>\n
Longford Town: Kian Moore; Sultan Adenekan (Stefan Ugbesia 45), Cole Omorehiomwan (Daniel McKenna 76), Taylor McCarthy, Jake Hough; Alex O\u2019Brien, Sean Moore (Scott Brady 66); Aaron Doran, Pharrell Manuel (Jamie Egan 67), Andy Paraschiv (Dean George 66); Daragh Murtagh<\/p>\n
Referee: Oliver Moran<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UCD’s safe passage to Sunday\u2019s First Division play-off final was never in doubt as they eased past Longford…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":667294,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-667293","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\/667293","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=667293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667293\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}