Longford Town 0-1 Galway United
Jake Keegan snatched all three points for Galway United at the City Calling Stadium with a well-created and superbly taken second-half winner against Longford Town.
The victory moves Tommy Dunne’s seventh-placed Galway to within a point of Longford in the Premier Division table.
Both sides made two changes each from last week with Kaleem Simon coming back in up front for David O’Sullivan for Longford, while Conor Powell was a late change at left-back as Martin Deady broke down in the warm-up.
Galway brought in goalkeeper Conor Winn and Alex Byrne.
In a lively opening to the game, both sides created early chances.
First, Galway left-back Marc Ludden cleared off the line from a Gary Shaw header after Pat Sullivan’s corner caused an almighty scramble in the visitors' penalty area.
Galway should really then have taken the lead on six minutes.
Skipper Ryan Connolly got free on the left to put over a sublime cross for Gary Shanahan, but the winger sliced his header tamely wide.
The tempo of the game was maintained as Longford substitute O’Sullivan, on the field just two minutes for the injured Shaw, had a goalbound shot blocked by Sami Oji from skipper Mark Salmon’s cross on 13 minutes
Winn then thwarted O’Sullivan with a good parry save from the striker’s close-range shot as Galway struggled again to deal with a Sullivan corner.
Ayman Ben Mohamed, Longford’s match-winner in Bray last week, was next up to threaten the Galway goal, flashing a crisp half-volley not far wide.
In a very open game, Galway were troubling Longford when they got forward and Keegan should have done better than blaze over the top when put clean through by Byrne on 34 minutes.
Longford showed more purpose from the start of the second half with Ludden making a terrific block to clear a drive from Longford skipper Mark Salmon seven minutes in.
It mattered not, as Galway stole the lead with their first attack of the second half on 61 minutes.
Shanahan showed clever feet to nip past Powell down the right to whip over an excellent cross which Keegan finished to the net with a well-placed looping header.
It might have been 2-0 five minutes later. Keegan found space in the box to set up David O’Leary whose shot was cleared off the line by defender Rhys Gorman.
Keegan should have had a second five minutes from time but chipped straight at Paul Skinner after Longford defender Mark Rossiter played a quick free kick directly to him.
Longford Town: Paul Skinner; Pat Sullivan, Rhys Gorman, Mark Rossiter, Conor Powell; Mark Salmon, Kevin O‘Connor, Stephen Rice (Lorcan Shannon 70), Ayman Ben Mohamed; Kaleem Simon, Gary Shaw (David O'Sullivan 11).
Galway United: Conor Winn; Colm Horgan, Sami Oji, Stephen Walsh, Marc Ludden; Gary Shanahan, Alex Byrne, David O’Leary, Jason Molloy (Kevin Garcis 55); Ryan Connolly; Jake Keegan.
Referee: Sean Grant (Wexford).
