Bray Wanderers 0
Dundalk 2
Daniel Gorman reports from the Carlisle Grounds
A STRIKER’S FINISH from Pat Hoban and a late John Mountney strike saw off a spirited Bray Wanderers fight as Dundalk maintained top spot.
It was far from a polished performance from the Lilywhites. They barely tested Aaron Dillon but a lack of firepower from the Seagulls made it smooth sailing for Stephen Kenny’s charges.
The opener arrived in the 26th minute as Kristian Adorjan’s corner fell to Hoban and one instinctive swipe of his foot saw the ball cushioning the net.
Mountney sealed things when he emphatically dispatched Duffy’s cutback in the 94th minute.
With Martin Russell watching from the home dugout, Bray Wanderers displayed a resilient shell.
They probed first when a Kevin Lynch cross flicked off the head of Stephen Folan and two Dundalk defenders failed to clear. This saw the ball fall unexpectedly to Paul O’Conor but the midfielder couldn’t react in time and bundled the ball into Gabriel Sava’s hands.
Table-toppers Dundalk should have trailed in the 13th minute. Ronan Coughlan’s threaded pass through a static Dundalk defence set-up Aaron Greene but the striker – without a goal to his name in 2018 – drilled his effort wide when he should have scored.
Aaron Dillon is a man normally under the cosh but in the first half on Friday he only had two things to do; bat away a Robbie Benson cross-cum-shot and pick the ball out of the back of the net.
Gary McCabe danced inside two sliding tackles on the stroke of half time and cut into the box. A potshot was fired towards the near post but Save dealt with it well.
A downbeat second half saw Wanderers unable to break down Dundalk.
They almost did in the most spectacular fashion when a 50-yard lob from McCabe had Sava scrambling but the flailing shot-stopper brilliantly clawed it away from under the crossbar.
Despite drawing another blank, there were encouraging signs for the Co. Wicklow club while it’s three more precious points for Dundalk.
BRAY WANDERERS: Aaron Dillon; Dan McKenna (Jake Kelly, 82), Hugh Douglas, Conor Kenna, Kevin Lynch; Paul O’Conor, Rhys Gorman (Ger Pender, 65); Ronan Coughlan, Gary McCabe, Cory Galvin (Sean Heaney, 73); Aaron Greene.
DUNDALK: Gabriel Sava; Sean Gannon, Daniel Cleary, Stephen Folan, Dane Massey; Chris Shields, Robbie Benson; Jamie McGrath (Stephen O’Donnell, 84), Kristian Adorjan (John Mountney, H/T), Michael Duffy; Patrick Hoban (Marco Tagbajumi, 73).
Referee: Sean Grant.