Devon fall to their heaviest defeat of the season

Date Published: {J}

Salthill Devon 1

Cork City 5

Salthill Devon suffered their heaviest defeat of the season when early league leaders Cork City put five past them in Drom on Friday afternoon.

The visitors were reduced to 10 men in the 68th minute, but by that stage were three goals to the good, and they went on to add another two, with Devon’s sole reply coming from Ciprian Straut from the penalty spot.

Kevin O’Regan was refereeing in the Airtricity Leaguer for the first time, and he had a busy debut, awarding three penalties and brandishing one red card in what was an incident-packed game that was a slow-burner to start with.

Devon more than matched their visitors in the opening half, and looked to be heading into the break on level terms but the Leesiders struck twice in the space of three minutes just before half-time to take complete control of the game.

The opener came in the 40th minute when Greg O’Halloran got on the end of Gearoid Morrissey’s free-kick, and the home side were still reeling when City added a second two minutes later, Davin O’Neill converting from the spot after Cian Fadden as adjudged to have tripped Shane Duggan in the area.

Those two strikes knocked the stuffing out of Devon, and when Graham Cummins added a third just before the hour mark the floodgates threatened to open. Credit to Devon, however, who never let their heads drop, and they were given an opening back into the game in the 68th minute.

Daniel Rupa raced through on goal, Mark McNulty came racing off his line but was second to the ball, and when he brought down the raiding Devon player, O’Regan had little choice but to send off the ‘keeper and point to the spot.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Sentinel.