Allianz Hurling League Division 2A

Antrim 5-27 Meath 1-15

Offaly 5-29 Mayo 1-13

Kerry 1-20 Wicklow 1-12

Allianz Hurling League Division 2B

Kildare 5-21 Roscommon 2-12

Down 2-26 London 0-16

Derry 4-22 Warwickshire 2-7

Allianz Hurling League Division 3A

Armagh 1-19 Louth 1-18

Donegal 1-15 Monaghan 1-5

Tyrone 0-23 Longford 1-15

Allianz Hurling League Division 3B

Sligo 2-17 Leitrim 1-15

Lancashire 1-12 Fermanagh 0-6

Meath’s aspirations of reaching a League final were officially ended this afternoon as they succumbed to a 24-point defeat to Antrim in the first ever competitive intercounty fixture played at O’Cahan Park in Portglenone.

Eoghan Campbell and Keelan Molloy got early goals for Antrim with James McNaughton and Neil McManus adding further green flags after half time. Alan Douglas and Luke Moran were sent off for Meath, both on second yellow cards, who now have one game left against Mayo and will need to win that to be sure of avoiding relegation.

Certainly Mayo will find it hard to pick themselves up after they suffered another very heavy defeat this afternoon, 5-29 to 1-13 in their first ever competitive meeting with Offaly, played at the Connacht Centre of Excellence in Bekan today.  

David Nally had two goals on the board early for Michael Fennelly’s side before his club mate Oisín Kelly added a third to make it 3-13 to 0-7 in favour of the Faithful men by half time. Nally completed his hat-trick and David King added another goal while Eoghan Cahill fired 0-12 for the Offaly men, who take on Wicklow next week.

Arklow was the venue for Wicklow’s clash with Kerry on Saturday where the Kingdom took an 0-14 to 0-6 interval lead and wrapped up the win thanks to a Jason Diggins goal shortly after half time. 

The big game in Division 2B was played at Hawkfield today, where Roscommon got out to a great start through early goals from Cillian Egan and Mickey Joe Egan, but were quickly reeled in by a hugely impressive Kildare side.

Jack Sheridan, Brian Byrne and Paul Divilly all got some excellent scores as Kildare recovered from being six points down to lead by 3-13 to 2-7 at half time. The match lost some of it’s zip after half time and outside of Cathal Dolan (0-10) and Byrne (1-11) there wasn’t much scoring, at least until the closing minutes when Byrne and Sheridan fired in late goals to turn it into a double scores game.

This Division is also a case of three into two, as Kildare, Derry and Down are all fighting it out for league final places.

Derry had it easy against Warwickshire on Saturday with Odhrán McKeever firing a hat-trick in their 4-22 to 2-7 win, while Oisín McManus (0-10), Pearse Óg McCrickard (1-6) and Eoghan Costello (0-5) did most of the damage for Down in London, where they recorded a 16-point win.

London were competitive in the first half and a superb save from Stephen Keith was needed to keep the visitors 1-11 to 0-9 up at half time. Kieran Morrissey opened the scoring for the Exiles after half time but Down scored seven of the next eight points to give them plenty of breathing room going into the final 15 minutes.  

The game of the day in this Division was in the Athletic Grounds where Armagh pipped Louth at the post, Dean Gaffney’s free with the last puck of the game sealing a one-point win. Paddy McBride pointed in the 49th minute to put Armagh 0-14 to 0-9 up, but from then on Louth found another gear and placed ball strikes from Gaffney were Armagh’s only other scores. Darren Geoghegan, Feidhlim Joyce and Ryan Walsh were all on target as the Wee County drew level, only to be denied a memorable victory at the end.

Donegal had no such problems against Monaghan at O’Donnell Park in Letterkenny where PJ McCarron’s second half goal crowned a 1-15 to 0-5 win, while Tyrone are also well in the promotion hunt after their 0-23 to 1-15 win over Longford, for whom Iomar Creaven’s goal came far too late to salvage a result.  

There were no surprises in this afternoon’s local derby at Markievicz Park where Sligo made it two wins from two with a five-point victory over Leitrim, while on Saturday Abbotstown was the venue for Lancashire’s 1-12 to 0-6 victory over Fermanagh.