A bit of a short one today, not much to write about, a miserable 0-0 draw to Derry. Although we remain top of the table, there’s nothing to be happy about with our performance today.
A bitter taste lingers in the mouth of Shelbourne fans with the performance today. At points you could tell that we were missing Coyler on the field demanding the team, and with Sean Boyd not starting. Duffer came out with a post match interview and mentioned that the whole team has caught a bug, which now makes sense as why he was very content with a draw at home. To be honest, it’s a bit embarrassing that Derry couldn’t beat us today if our squad was sick.
A very boring first half, not much to write about. Both teams started very, very slow with not much to say. Neither looked better than the other.
In the 21st minute, Derry had a dangerous attack getting inside the box but the shot went too wide and didn’t challenge Conor Kearns.
27th minute sees Derry take a corner, which is cleared and then makes it’s way to Liam Burt which brings it all the way up to in front of Derry’s box where he passes it trough to Evan Caffery out left, who brings it in slightly before popping a shot and it just going wide. Unfortunately if it did go in, the flag was raised and it was off side.
32nd minute sees a free kick for Derry, which is whipped in and finds its way in when a Derry player takes a shot but it goes comfortably over the goal.
That’s all for the first half, let’s talk about the second half:
Not much to talk about again. In the 62nd minute Derry had a nice opportunity but Mullen shoots and it goes very wide, unable to kick the ball how he wanted to.
In the 70th, Derry had a dangerous free kick, which Patching took, but Conor Kearns made a great save to keep the game 0-0. This brings us up to the 83rd where Duffy is on the left side of our box and whips one into the back post which finds Mullen, but he fumbled the header and couldn’t make anything out of it.
Six minutes of added time were added but nothing came of this, Eoin O’Shea blew his whistle and it was full time in Tolka Park.
Considering most of the squad caught a bug, and after hearing this I’m quite happy with the performance today, and overall it was quite funny that a strong Derry side couldn’t defeat a sick squad of Shelbourne players.
Duffer was very emotive, and seemed very happy with the result considering the circumstances surrounding his squad.
This match had some notable people watching on from the stands, including Bertie Ahern, Stephen Kenny, and the Bohemian Director of Football Pat Fenton and Keith Buckley, Bohemian player.
Anyways there isn’t too much more to write about. We go on the road this Friday to face Drogheda United. Hopefully the squad will recover well and be able to give it their all.
Thank you for reading as always…
UTFR