Late Equalizer Saves Sligo Rovers Against Dundalk
Gareth McElroy snatched a point for Sligo Rovers deep into stoppage time at Oriel Park, turning Dundalk’s familiar frustration into outright anguish and breathing life into Darren Purse’s survival bid.
The defender’s scruffy toe-poke, forced home after a late goalmouth scramble, punished yet another late collapse from a Dundalk side that cannot hold what it earns. For the fifth game in a row, they led. For the fifth game in a row, they failed to win.
Horgan hits a milestone, Dundalk waste their moment
For an hour this looked like the night Dundalk would finally steady themselves.
They were on the front foot from the first whistle. Sam Sargeant had to be sharp early, getting behind efforts from Ronan Teahan, Daryl Horgan and Cian Dillon inside 17 minutes as the hosts pinned Sligo back.
Sligo’s response was fleeting. On 19 minutes, new signing Jack Shorrock swung in a teasing cross from the left and Luke Pearce climbed highest, but his header lacked conviction and dropped tamely into Enda Minogue’s arms. That was their only effort of the half.
Dundalk, by contrast, kept coming. Trevor Clarke rattled the crossbar with a fierce strike from outside the box on 20 minutes, the ball crashing back out with Sargeant beaten. Bobby Burns then lashed over when unmarked on the edge of the area, before Clarke again passed up a glorious opening, heading wide from eight yards after Horgan’s corner picked him out with the left side of the goal yawning.
The pressure finally told after the break. Four minutes into the second half, Shorrock broke in behind Mayowa Animasahun and forced Minogue to tip over his rising drive, McElroy heading narrowly wide from the resulting corner. It felt like a warning. Dundalk ignored it.
Instead, they landed the first blow.
On 52 minutes, Clarke drove at Sligo again and slipped Dillon in down the right. His ball into the area initially looked destined for Harry Groome, who couldn’t quite bring it under control, but the midfielder recovered smartly, laying it off to his captain on the edge of the box. Horgan didn’t hesitate. One touch to set, then a thumping finish high into the net for the 100th goal of his club career and his 60th in Dundalk colours.
Oriel Park rose, sensing a routine finish. The script should have been straightforward from there. It wasn’t.
Sargeant stands tall as chances go begging
Once in front, Dundalk had the opportunities to kill it.
Shorrock’s deep free-kick had Minogue back-pedalling to tip over, but most of the serious work came at the other end for Sargeant, who produced a superb point-blank save to deny Dillon after Horgan had nodded the ball down in the area.
Horgan himself almost doubled the lead on 78 minutes when his free-kick took a deflection and flashed just wide. Then, with four minutes of normal time left, Sargeant again came to Sligo’s rescue, springing to his right to claw away a ferocious drive from the excellent Teahan that looked destined for the bottom corner.
Dundalk kept the ball, kept the territory, kept Sligo penned in. What they didn’t keep was their composure.
Late chaos, late punishment
Sligo, bottom of the table on goal difference at kick-off and still stinging from a late concession against Drogheda United six days earlier, had offered little in open play. Yet Purse’s side stayed in the game, clung to the 1-0, and waited for something – anything – to fall their way.
It arrived in the first minute of stoppage time, via a moment Dundalk will replay in their heads all week.
A hopeful ball into the box drew Minogue off his line. He came to claim, misjudged it, and suddenly the area was chaos. Substitute Trey George managed to stab a shot goalwards, the ball ricocheting loose. McElroy reacted first, stretching out a toe to force it over the line and silence a home crowd that had already begun to taste relief.
Sligo’s bench erupted. Purse, only two games into the job, had a second late point in six days. For a team that has lived on the wrong side of fine margins this season, this one felt like a small but significant turn.
Two points gained, or two lost?
On paper, it’s a draw. In reality, it felt like a defeat for Dundalk.
They have now dropped 26 points from winning positions this season – four more points than Sligo have collected in total. That number hangs over them like a storm cloud, each late concession reinforcing a pattern they cannot seem to break.
For Sligo, the table still makes grim reading. They remain bottom on goal difference. Yet this result, carved out in stoppage time in a ground where they spent most of the night under pressure, sends them to Derry City next week with something they have been short of: belief.
Dundalk, meanwhile, must work out how a team that can dominate so many games keeps leaving the door open at the death – and how many more times they can afford to do it before the season’s damage becomes permanent.
