Ten Men Secure The Win

Winter is well and truly here, it was a dull cold day as I made my way to Bernard Curtis Park to catch some LSL Premier Sunday action.  It has been a while since I have seen an Inchicore team in action with me being away last week and games being cancelled before that.  After a minor blip against Wayside Celtic Inchicore returned to winning ways last weekend away to St Marks and were hoping for another good result against early season pace setters Lakelands FC.

Ciaran Ronan is surrounded

Inchiocre got off to a flying start when John Luby, who I believe has a road named after him in Inchicore, struck a sweet shot barely five minutes into the game low into the corner of the goal leaving the visitors keeper with no chance.  Stephen Fay then made it two minutes later with a neat finish to leave Lakelands in a total state of shock.  The away side threatened as the shock of conceding two early goals wore off but were thwarted time and again by a resolute Inchicore defence leaving new goalkeeper James Hillis with little to do.

The second half got off to a muted start but Inchicore soon found themselves under pressure when midfield maestro Dean Costello received his marching orders from the referee.  Lakelands looked to find the gaps in the home teams defences from that moment onwards.  They were met with a passionate and determinde display of defending from Wes McDermott who almost single handedly kept them at bay.

Wes McDermott and Sean Blake stop another Lakelands attack

With time running out Lakelands launched one final attack  The visitors forward found some space and got a shot away that goalkeeper Hillis palmed onto the post but the bounce of the ball went the against him and suddenly Lakelands were back in the game.  It was too little too late however as the referee blew his whistle to Inchicores delight as they claimed maximum points from a very tricky encounter.