Laois’s name will be in the draw for Round 2 of the All Ireland SFC Qualifiers on Monday morning - but only after they survived a late scare against Wicklow in Joule Park in Aughrim on Saturday evening.
Played in glorious sunshine, Laois looked to be home and dry when Donie Kingston goaled in the 60th minute and they stretched nine points clear following points from Damien O’Connor and Colm Begley.
But the home side refused to give in and two late goals - from sub Paddy Byrne and impressive corner-forward Paul Cunningham - reduced the gap to three as the game entered injury time.
Johnny McGee’s side threw everything forward in injury time but Laois were able to hold firm.
It had all looked so comfortable for Laois for so long.
Despite playing against the breeze, they got off to a dream start and were 1-3 to 0-1 up after just ten minutes, the goal coming from Walsh who was hugely impressive in the opening half. With Kingston, David Conway, Colm Begley and John O’Loughlin also on target Laois led 1-8 to 0-5 at the break. Wicklow’s scores in the opening half came from Cunningham (two), Seanie Furlong (two) and Mark Kenny.
Laois pushed further clear early in the second half but Wicklow weren’t in any mood to go away. Half-time sub John McGrath caused Laois all sorts of problems and as well as kicking two fine points he did a lot of the work to set Cunningham up for Wicklow’s first goal. That briefly reduced the gap to three points but Laois’s response was swift and emphatic with Kingston and O’Loughlin hitting back with points straight away.
Furlong kept Wicklow in touch with a free but the game seemed to be up when Kingston won a long ball from James Finn and beat two defenders before slotting past Robert Lambert and as the game ticked towards its conclusion, Laois seemed safe.
Wicklow ensured it went to the wire, though. First Byrne slammed home a fine goal and from the next attack Cunningham had another. There was still three minutes of injury time to play but Laois hung on.
Laois: G Brody; D Strong, M Timmons, T Collins (0-1); E Buggie, P McMahon, C Begley (0-2); J O'Loughlin (0-2), B Quigley; A Farrell (0-1), D Conway (0-1), D O'Connor (0-1); S Attride, D Kingston (1-4, 0-2f), G Walsh (1-3, 0-2 ‘45s). Subs: J Finn for Quigley (inj -32), E O’Carroll for Attride (bc - 42), R Munnelly (0-1) for Walsh (43), K Lillis for McMahon (46), A Doran for O'Carroll (inj - 60 mins)
Wicklow: R Lambert; C Hyland, A McLoughlin, S Kelly; D Fitzgerald, B Kennedy, J Crowe; D Boothman, R Finn; D Hayden, D Healy, C Ffrench; M Kenny (0-2), S Furlong (0-3, 3f), P Cunningham (2-3, 0-1f). Subs: J McGrath (0-2) for Boothman (half-time), P Traynor for Ffrench (half-time), P Byrne (1-0) for Fitzgerald (57 mins)
Referee: B Cassidy (Derry)
