Longford Town continue to be Waterford United's bogey side and, despite taking a first-half lead at the RSC, the Blues lost 2-1 and missed their opportunity to climb above Bray Wanderers off the bottom of the table.
The Blues looked the more industrious side during the early exchanges and, following a period of intense pressure on the Longford defence, they took the lead from the penalty spot on 26 minutes.
Robbie Hedderman played a long ball into the 18-yard area and defender Kevin Doherty whipped the legs out from under Paul McCarthy. Ger McCarthy's penalty was so well struck that, even though goalkeeper Seamus Kelly got his hands on the rising ball, its powerful momentum carried it into the roof of the net.
Longford equalised on 59 minutes with their first serious assault on the home goal. Dessie Baker played the ball through for David Mooney and his shot on-the-run was only parried by goalkeeper Ben Spicer into the path of Davy Byrne who steered the ball into the net.
The Midlanders took the lead on 76 minutes when a Stephen Gough corner was headed away by Alan Keely but the inrushing Alan Kirby pounced on the ball and threaded his low shot through the crowded goalmouth into the corner of the net.
Longford almost took the lead four minutes earlier when Doherty swivelled in front of goal but his shot was fumbled out of play by Spicer and the subsequent corner was cleared away.
Five minutes from the end, Longford's assistant manager, Aaron O'Callaghan, was ordered out of the dug-out by referee Anthony Buttimer and he sat out the remaining minutes with his boss, Alan Matthews, who is already serving a three-month ban.
United forced the visitors to concede three corners in the first seven minutes of the game and, during that spell, Longford twice cleared the ball off the line.
Kirby prevented Byrne from scoring an own-goal from a James Chambers corner and, less than a minute later, Doherty was perfectly placed to clear Robert Brosnan’s goal-bound header up the field.
Waterford United: Spicer, Flynn, Hedderman, Keely, Browne, Reynolds, Chambers, P. McCarthy, G. McCarthy, Brosnan (Grant, 68 minutes), Kavanagh. Substitutes not used: McDonald, Russell, Young, Dunphy.
Longford Town: Kelly, Gough, Murphy, O'Connor, Kirby, Baker (Cronin, 85 minutes), Byrne, Doherty, Mooney (Wrexler, 92 minutes), Freeman, Brennan. Substitutes not used: Dempsey, O'Riordan, Lynch.
Referee: Anthony Buttimer, Cork.
