ALLIANZ FOOTBALL LEAGUE DIVISION FOUR FINAL

Louth 3-12 Antrim 1-14

By Daragh O'Conchuir at Croke Park

An injury time goal from the powerful Conor Grimes sealed a brilliant second half comeback for Louth, who will go into the summer in good heart after winning the Allianz Football League Division 4 final.

Antrim made all the early running, Tomás McCann drilling over at the end of a lovely interchange of passes directly from the throw-on. Brian McAleese pointed a free soon afterwards and a couple of other opportunities went astray.

They were rocked back on their heels for a brief period, though, after Louth scored a goal from their first attack in the fifth minute.

It owed much to the strength and patience of Grimes and when the full-forward timed his pass to the hard-running Derek Maguire immaculately, the Young Irelands man finished with a resounding shot to the roof of the Antrim net.

Mathew Fitzpatrick and Conor Murray settled the Saffrons with points, but Louth’s riposte was impressive, with three consecutive points to take the lead for the first time.

Some of these were right out of the top drawer, as Jim McEneaney sent a soaring effort over from a sideline kick on the wrong side and Maguire found the target from distance  with the outside of the boot also.

Antrim had restored parity when Fitzpatrick clinically fired low to goal five minutes before the interval, after sneaking behind the Louth defence and with McCann adding a couple of frees, either side of Ryan Burns’ first score for Colin Kelly’s crew, it was Antrim leading at the break 1-9 to 1-5.

The Ulstermen quickly stretched the margin to five as McCann, who finished with eight points, scored from play, but as the game became increasingly scrappy and both teams shot some dreadful wides, it was Louth that gradually chipped away at the deficit.

Burns and Califf raised white flags and Antrim were living very dangerously. The excellent Declan Byrne was unlucky to see his shot deflected over off the crossbar. Soon after, Kevin O’Boyle cleared off the line.

A goal seemed inevitable and it came in the 59th minute from the boot of the hugely influential McEneaney.

Just returned from having a blood injury attended to, the Geraldines playmaker drove low to the far corner from the edge of the large parallelogram to put Louth ahead.

Antrim did claw back the deficit to restore parity, but they were always struggling in the middle third, and their creaking defence gave in once more, as Grimes ripped them apart for the definitive goal.

James Califf sent over a point to enable the supporters to relax and there was no way back from there for Antrim.

Scorers for Louth: R Burns 0-4(3fs); D Maguire, J McEneaney (0-1 sideline) 1-1 each; D Byrne, J Califf (2fs) 0-3 each; C Grimes 1-0

Scorers for Antrim: T McCann 0-8(6fs), M Fitzpatrick 1-1; C Murray 0-2; B Neeson 0-1; R Johnson, P McBride 0-1 each.

Louth: C Lynch, P Rath, P Reilly, K Toner, D Maguire, D McMahon, E Lafferty, J Stewart, J Califf, D Byrne, J McEneaney, T Durnin, C McKeever, C Grimes, R Burns. Subs: J Bingham for Toner (13), A Williams for Bingham BC (35+1), R Moore for McMahon (44), G McSorley for McEneaney (51-56), McSorley for Burns (70+5)

Antrim: C Kerr, N Delargy, C Burke, R Johnson, K O’Boyle, M Johnson, J Laverty, N McKeever, J Carron, M Fitzpatrick, K Nibolock, C Murray, B Neeson, M McCann, T McCann. Sub: R Murray for Neeson (48), P McBride for Carron (53), D McAleese for Fitzpatrick (58), M Sweeney for Laverty (63), J Crozier for Burke (67)

Referee: J Henry (Mayo).