Meath fail to fire as Dublin march on

Looking demoralised and dispirited well before the end Meath succumbed to 0-7 to 2-14 defeat to Dublin in the Leinster u-20 FC at Parnell Park today. 

Na Fianna's Shane Walsh was on the team-sheet to start and he was replaced by Luke Mitchell. However, even with Walsh in the side it is doubtful Meath would have won this one. 

This was as lacklusture, disjointed display by Meath who never recovered from the concession of a second minute goal scored by Dublin's Luke Swan. The young Royals were already in trouble at the interval when they trailed 0-3 to 1-8 although they did play the opening 30 minutes against the wind. 

Yet even with the help of the elements in the second-half they were unable to up their game.  Dublin instead grabbed a second goal just after the resumption with Lorcan O'Dell slicing through the Meath defence to score and from then on it was obvious what team would progress to face Laois in the final. 

Meath failed to score from play in the opening half with their scores coming from pointed frees by Luke Mitchell and Jordan Morris with Liam Byrne tagging on a score from a '45'. In the second-half Meath really struggled to deal with Dublin's physicality and while Cian Rogers, Matthew Costello, Mitchell and Daithi McGowan lofted over points the team in green and gold scored far too infrequently to touble Dublin's dominance. 

Dublin continued to steadily add to their account to easily progress. The nearest Meath came to finding the net was in the opening half when Costello had a shot charged down. Nothing went right for Meath on a day to forget for the county. 

Read how it all went wrong for Meath in the next issue of the Meath Chronicle as well as photographs from the game. 

Meath players get ready to face Dublin today.