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2025 Allianz Football League Division 4 – Limerick 1-17 Carlow 0-13
Limerick defeated Carlow by 1-17 to 0-13 in Round 4 of the Allianz Football League Division 4 on Saturday February 22nd at Netwatch Cullen Park Carlow.
Limerick footballers make it back-to-back league wins with victory over Carlow
Report by John Redington for the Limerick Leader newspaper
“VERY happy with the performance but there’s more in us,” expressed satisfied manager Jimmy Lee as his Limerick footballers secured a deserved 1-17 to 0-13 victory over Carlow in Division 4 of the Allianz Football League at Netwatch Cullen Park on Saturday evening.
Limerick followed up on ending a 17-match winless streak in the National League against London the week before by emphatically getting the better of hosts under the floodlights of Dr Cullen Park.
“Those two points on the board change our position ahead of our meeting with Tipperary next Saturday in Rathkeale,” Jimmy Lee added.
The win, together with Tipp’s defeat to London, has left Lee’s charges very much back in the promotion hunt despite dropping three points in their opening two outings against Longford and Wexford.
And on this latest display, the Shannonsiders are certainly in with a chance of taking the second place on offer in the promotion race as they moved on from a tightly-contested first half to put the outcome beyond doubt long before referee Niall Quinn’s final whistle.
In fact, both sides struggled to find fluency to get going before the break. It took the only goal of the game just after the half-time to take the contest out of the rulebook and into the play on the field as Limerick moved quickly into a match-winning lead.
Carlow’s best bet early on lay in their delivery of the high ball into the goalmouth, but that disappeared after Limerick’s midfield diamond took control. Starved of primary possession, the home side were never given the space to vary their game and it was only in the closing few few minutes when their cause was long lost that they finally put together a run of scores.
Limerick were ahead within a minute off a James Naughton free but the visitors were lucky to see Shane Clarke’s shot off a breaking ball from a long delivery smothered by Mark McCarthy’s challenge before the Barrowsiders equalised with Ian Atkinson’s shot on the run.
However, the visitors hit back when Josh Ryan came up from his goals to send over a two-pointer free before Ciarán Moran’s reply was cancelled out by a Naughton free brought halfway up the length of the field for dissent.
Going into the second quarter, the host’s defensive shape was frustrating Limerick’s attempts to set up the shot and, when Conor Crowley pointed a free for a ‘three-forward foul’, they grabbed the momentum with Conor Doyle’s equaliser and Carlow edged their nose ahead when another ‘three-forward free’ was converted by Crowley.
However, Darragh O’Hagan had the sides back level again straight off the resulting kickout and the lead changed hands when Naughton sent over a free for a ‘three-forward foul’.
Paul Maher then had the chance to open up serious distance, but his shot at the end of a quick move was stopped on the line by Johnny Furey.
Limerick got some consolation with a Naughton pointed free, although they claimed it had been taken outside the 40 metre arc before Kein Murphy replied in added time to cut the Carlow deficit to a single point, 0-7 to 0-6, at the break.
Whatever frustrations the visitors had with their first half performance disappeared when two minutes of pressure from the restart ended with Maher bursting a hole in the defence and offloaded to the inrushing Naughton to slide the ball inside the far corner of the net.
Then, despite Emmett Rigter’s follow-up point being matched by John Murphy finishing at the end of his mazy solo, Anrew Meade immediately replied for Limerick and, after Tadhg Ó Siochrú was stopped by another spectacular Furey save, this was followed by Ryan coming up from his goalmouth to hoof over a mighty two-poinnter.
Trailing now by six points, Carlow answered through Aaron Amond’s point on the turn but struggled to get through the dense packing of the opposing defence along the 40 metre arc.
Carlow then failed to find the target again before the three-quarter mark and then were punished by a dissented free brought up to 13-metre line for Naughton to tap over. The deflated hosts then watched Limerick let it rip again as Peter Nash pointed off a flashing move. This score was followed by O’Hagan bagging his second of the game.
After Moran managed a reply for the Leinster side, scores from Ó Siochrú and Danny Neville had the gap out to ten points with just five regulation minutes to go.
Ross Dunphy’s introduction provided some zip to the Carlow attack. After Cormac Lomax struck for a point, Naughton sent over his sixth free at the other end for Limerick before Paddy McDonnell struck twice in added time for Carlow to close the scoring.
SCORERS: LIMERICK: James Naughton 1-6 (0-6 frees), Josh Ryan 0-4 (1 2xf, 1 2x), Darragh O’Hagan 0-2, Emmett Rigter, Andrew Meade, Peter Nash, Tadhg Ó Siochrú, Danny Neville 0-1 each. CARLOW: Ciarán Moran, Conor Crowley (2 frees), Conor Doyle (1 free), Paddy McDonnell 0-2 each, Ian Atkinson, Kevin Murphy, John Murphy, Aaron Amond, Cormac Lomax 0-1 each.
LIMERICK: Josh Ryan; Cormac Woulfe, Colm McSweeney , Mark McCarthy; Barry Coleman, Iain Corbett, Tony McCarthy; Darragh O’Hagan, Paul Maher; Andrew Meade, James Naughton, Cillian Fahy; Darach Ó Siochrú, Emmett Rigter; Killian Ryan.
SUBS: Tadhg Ó Siochrú for Cillian Fahy (injured, 16 mins), Peter Nash for Darach Ó Siochrú (half-time). Dasnny Neville for Paul Maher (53 mins), Robbie Childs for Iain Corbett (60 mins), Rory O’Brien for Amdrew Meade (64 mins).
CARLOW: Johnny Furey; Paddy Regan, Mark Furey, Colin Byrne; Shane Clarke, Ciarán Moran, John Murphy; Ian Atkinson, Liam Brennan; Conor Doyle, Lee Walker, Paddy McDonnell; Aaron Amond, Conor Crowley, Kevin Murphy.
SUBS: Niall Hickey for Lee Walker (half-time), Kyle Nolan for John Murphy (53 mins), Conor Lomax for Conor Crowley (60 mins), Ross Dunphy for Kevin Murphy (61 mins), Josh Egan for Aaron Amond (64 mins),
REFEREE: Niall Quinn (Clare)
Team News
Jimmy Lee and his selectors has just released their Limerick Senior Football team and match panel for their Round 4 Allianz Football League game:
Take a look at the Limerick Senior Football team that will face Carlow this Saturday evening in Netwatch Cullen Park, at 6pm. pic.twitter.com/7LHpcsQlPK— Limerick GAA (@LimerickCLG) February 22, 2025
This is the @Carlow_GAA team to play Limerick in Allianz League Division 4 in Netwatch Cullen Park this evening, 6pm.
Best of luck to players & Backroom Team.
All support welcome.
— Carlow GAA (@Carlow_GAA) February 22, 2025
