Excellent Longford Town register fourth victory in a row but miss out on the play-offs

It was another excellent display from Longford Town as they registered their fourth year in a row in a vain attempt  to snatch the last  of the promotion play-off positions with goals from Aaron Doran, Alex O’Brien and Stefan Ugbesia clinching all three points against second in the table Cobh Ramblers at Bishopsgate on Friday night.  

Longford Town . . . 3     Cobh Ramblers . . . 1 

With results elsewhere not working in their favour with the other contenders for fifth spot Treaty United and Wexford FC winning against Bray Wanderers and Kerry FC respectively, it developed into a disappointing end to the season for Longford who will have nothing but pride to play for in the midlands derby away to Athlone in the final fixture on Friday night next.

Building on the best run of results in the League of Ireland for quite some time and which must have given the manager Wayne Groves great satisfaction for the impressive manner in which he turn things around in such a strong finish to the season, Longford were brimming in confidence and this was clearly deflected  in the fine win against Cobh. 

A brilliant start yielded a delightful opening goal from Aaron Doran with just four minutes gone on the clock when he lobbed the ball over the advancing Cobh keeper Timothy Martin but the joy for the home supporters was short-lived as the visitors scored the equaliser soon after. 

A firm header from Barry Coffey flew past the Town keeper Kian Moore in the 8th minute but back came Longford with Doran going close while another scoring attempt from Emre Topcu was saved by Martin in the 18th minute.  

Longford had a lucky escape approaching the break when defender Eric Yoro cleared the ball off the line and after a goal from Alex O’Brien was ruled out by the linesman for offside following a corner from Pharrell Manuel in the early stages of the second half, the referee Oliver Moran rightly changed the decision. 

The Town were in no mood to let another lead slip from their grasp and struck the killer blow when  the clean through Stefan Ugbesia made sure of the home success with a wonderful third goal in the 65th minute 

LONGFORD TOWN: Kian Moore; Eric Yoro, Aaron Walsh, Oisin Hand, Ozaze Irhue; Pharrell Manuel, Aaron Doran, Alex O’Brien, Emre Topcu, Dean George; Stefan Ugbesia.

Subs:- Jamie Egan for Walsh (67 mins); Darragh Murtagh for Ugbesia (67 mins); Kyle Robinson for George (83 mins).

COBH RAMBLERS: Timothy Martin; Iestyn Hughes, Cian Coleman, Jonas HaKkinen, Shane Griffin; Cian Bargary, Niall O’Keeffe, Rhys Gourdie, Dylan McGlade; Barry Coffey, Cian Murphy.

Subs:- Samuel Bellis for Bargary, Matthew Whelan for O’Keeffe and John O’Donovan for Griffin (all in the 73rd minute); Harvey Cribb for Coffey and Mikey Carroll for Gourdie (both in the 77th minute). 

Referee: Oliver Moran.