All-Ireland SFC, Round 1: Roscommon 2-18 (2-3-12) Tyrone 3-16 (3-1-14)
Tyrone’s Ethan Jordan tapped over a match-winning free with just 30 seconds remaining to burn off Roscommon’s challenging at a blistering Dr Hyde Park.
This All-Ireland football championship first-round clash looked set for extra-time when Paul Carey’s two-pointer brought the home side level in the 69th minute.
However, Conn Kilpatrick won the resulting kickout and after some neat interplay, Eoin McElholm jinked inside for a scoring chance but was dragged to the ground inside the arc, gifting Jordan the close-range free.
“The character the boys showed, a couple of times it looked like the game had turned against us, but they kept fighting back, none more so than that last attack where we got the free to win it,” said Tyrone manager Malachy O’Rourke.
RM Block
“The boys have been working hard and we came down here today really determined to put on a big performance.”
Tyrone had led 2-11 to 1-9 at half-time but managed just two points in the first 22 minutes of the second half, during which time Roscommon scored 1-6 to lead by two.
But Roscommon goalkeeper Conor Carroll, who at that stage had only lost one of his second-half kickouts, undercooked a short restart in the 57th minute when attempting to thread the ball through a gap between Ciarán Daly and Frank Burns.
Daly pounced, won possession and fed Burns, who in turn offloaded to Mattie Donnelly to smack the ball beyond a back-peddling Carroll and put Tyrone back in front again.
It was a momentum-killer for Roscommon which noticeably sucked the energy out of the 16,181 strong crowd at the Hyde. To their credit, the Connacht champions appeared to have salvaged extra-time with the late two-pointer, but Tyrone had other ideas.
“It was disappointing at the end, but in fairness we kept plugging away but they got a free there towards the end to get the result out of it,” said Roscommon manager Mark Dowd.
The sweltering conditions contributed to an entertaining match, though there were several periods of slow ponderous football too.
Roscommon entered the fixture on the high of their provincial triumph while Tyrone hadn’t played since losing an Ulster preliminary quarter-final to Armagh six weeks ago.
Darragh Heneghan continued where he had left off in the Connacht decider by blazing a hole through the Tyrone defence in the fifth minute before blasting the ball beyond Niall Morgan.
Roscommon had a penalty claim turned away soon after but when Daire Cregg and Dylan Ruane both pointed the home side had built an early 1-3 to 0-4 lead.
But they just didn’t kick on from that bright start. Instead, Tyrone were able to punch holes in the Roscommon defence and scored two goals in a three-minute spell to wrestle control of the game – McElholm with the first of those in the 23rd minute, followed by Ronan Cassidy’s strike moments later.
McElholm’s goal came direct from a long Morgan kickout to Kilpatrick in the middle of the field.
Both goalkeepers produced some brilliant kickouts throughout the contest but Morgan was almost faultless in the second half, losing only one of his 11 restarts.
Roscommon were guilty of overplaying the ball in some of their attacks and all too often the last pass wasn’t on the money. It was uncharacteristic, given how clinical they had been during the Connacht championship.
Having led by five at the break, Tyrone had a chance to push further ahead on the restart, but Carroll made a good save from Seánie O’Donnell.
When O’Donnell popped over a point in the 41st minute, it meant all six of Tyrone’s starting forwards had scored. However, they failed to score again until Donnelly’s goal 16 minutes later.
But that strike was a pivotal moment in the game.
“Yeah, absolutely. It probably got them back in and got them going again,” said Dowd.
“When we felt that we probably had a bit of momentum built up at that stage and it probably took us a while to respond again from that. But credit to our lads, we kept plugging away.”
Tyrone got the job done without the injured Darragh Canavan, ruled out due to a hip flexor injury.
And having endured a rather lacklustre year so far, this victory might kick-start their season.
“Time will tell. Looking at all the teams that are left, it’s a very competitive championship,” said O’Rourke.
“We lost against Armagh so we were determined to bounce back today, and we did that.
“The way the league went, we knew we had an awful lot of work to do. We knew the boys were working hard, there was a good spirit among them, but it wasn’t showing maybe in some of our results and performances, and people weren’t slow to tell us that.”
For Roscommon, the challenge now is to refocus. A criticism tossed at them prior to this fixture was that they previously failed to rise to the occasion when expectations climb. That perception remains alive after this defeat.
“We’ve three weeks now of a rest but if we’re ambitious, we’re going to have it week on week now going forward,” said Dowd.
“So it’s about ourselves now, what way we go after these next three weeks and have ourselves right for the next day.”
ROSCOMMON: C Carroll (0-1-0, 1tpf); C Neary, C Keogh, E McCormack; R Fallon, R Daly, S Lambe; K Doyle, C Ryan; D Ruane (0-0-1), E Smith (1-0-1), D Heneghan (1-0-0); D Murtagh (0-1-6, 4f), D Cregg (0-0-2), R Heneghan. Subs: C Hand (0-0-2) for R Heneghan (45 mins), S Cunnane for Ryan, P Carey (0-1-0) for Ruane (both 52), B Stack for Fallon (53), C McKeon for Cregg (59).
TYRONE: N Morgan; J Clarke, C Quinn, N Devlin (0-0-1), M McKernan, P Teague (0-0-1), K McGeary; B Kennedy, C Kilpatrick (0-0-1); S O’Donnell (0-0-1), R Cassidy (1-0-0), C Daly (0-0-1); E McElholm (1-0-3), M Donnelly (1-0-1), E Jordan (0-1-5, 2f, 1′45). Subs: D McCurry for Cassidy, F Burns for McGeary (both 52 mins); C Bogue for Daly (63), R McHugh for Kennedy (68).
Referee: D Gough (Meath).
