No Meath luck as Cavan falter in New York final

Paul Fitzpatrick in New York

Meath football was well represented in Sunday’s New York Senior Championship final at Gaelic Park, where Sligo produced a superb performance to defeat Cavan by 4-16 to 1-13.

Cavan had four Meathmen involved – Skryne duo Jack Swan and Charlie Swan, Carnaross forward Frank O’Reilly – while Ratoath’s Connell Ahearne was part of the newly-crowned Sligo panel.

It was O’Reilly who emerged as Cavan’s leading scorer, finishing with 0-9 as Barry Dalton’s side suffered defeat in the decider for the second successive season.

Sligo came into the game as underdogs but produced a powerful and athletic display, with former Offaly senior Cian Farrell providing the class in attack and New York-born Brian Coughlan causing huge problems with his direct running.

Coughlan struck an early goal but Cavan responded impressively. Jack McKenna landed two points, Conor Keenan added another and former Cavan senior Padraig Faulkner palmed home a goal as the Blues moved 1-3 to 1-0 ahead.

From there, though, Sligo took over.

Aaron Kelleghan struck their second goal before Coughlan created another for Tadhg O’Riordan. Captain Eoghan Kerin then landed a superb two-pointer with the outside of his boot as Sligo established a commanding 3-6 to 1-3 half-time advantage.

Farrell and Coughlan continued to pile on the pressure after the restart and the contest was effectively settled when Sligo turned over a Cavan kick-out and Coughlan powered through for his second goal.

Cavan battled on and O’Reilly, who has strong family Breffni links, found his range from placed balls. The Carnaross man converted a 45 and three two-point frees as he accumulated 0-9, but the gap was simply too large to bridge.