Too Little Too Late For Buckley’s Fingal As Maritimo Progress

Sporting Fingal 2 (4)

CS Maritimo 3 (6)

The European dream for Airtricity Premier side Sporting Fingal has ended tonight, but Fingal didnt go down without a fight scoring 2 goals very late on but it was too little too late for the FAI Cup holders 3-2 the score tonight, 6-4 on aggregate.

The Portuguese side showed late on last week just what they could do and wanted to remind Liam Buckleys men of that tonight. And that's exactly what they did and a golden opportunity opened up on 4 minutes, after Tcho bent a long range free-kick at goal, and Clarke had to tip it over and out for a corner, Fingals defense held up quite well and managed to clear that danger.

Moments later Tcho was causing even more problems for Clarke in goal but he was dealing with the chances very well, but in saying that a goal was looming from the visitors.

After tones of chances to try and score, Maritimo did after 20 minutes through a penalty, after Shaun Williams  hauled Tcho down in the box. Alonso scored and Maritimo lead 4-2 on aggregate, Fingal faced a mountain ahead.

Shaun Williams clearly wasnt settling in well to the game and only moments later, gave the ball away sloppily, allowing Maritimo to race forward with four attackers. They wasted the chance though and ended up trying to lob the ball over the Fingal defense.

Fingal did have their chances aswel and they were quite decent. The first of them came on 28 minutes Ronan Finn shot from long range, and keeper Peterson could only parry it. Crowe ALMOST tapped in on the rebound. Maritimo did look a little shaky at the back and Their keeper had spilled the ball on a number of occasions and they were playing a dangerous game by conceding corners every time the ball came into the box for a fingal attack.

Fingals problems have been consistent all season, they create tones of chances and can never finish them off. The last 10 minutes of the first half dropped a little in pace and there was nothing more to report from the first half. Liam Buckley was in for perhaps his biggest half time team talk of his life.

Fingal came out in the second half, more determined to win ball and keep it and they did it well in the opening exchanges of the half. Glen Crowe with the first opportunity with a lovely strike but just went over the bar. Un-lucky from the man who used to play his football in the ground with Bohemians. He would have been thankful not to have been part of the squad embarrassed on Tuesday night.

Sporting Fingals second half dominance was only brief and they found themselves with a bigger mountain to climb on 67 minutes, A screamer from Marquinho made Maritimos progression a little more likely, it really was a great goal after Fingals defense totally opened up and there was nothing the keeper could do but watch the ball fly past him.

Fingal certainly could not not have been faulted for their lack of effort in this game against a team of mostly Samba boys and they were heaping the pressure on Maritimo and you got the impression that there was a famous victory on the cards in Dalymount Park infront of a record 'home crowd' of 2150 on occasions it was certainly more than the side who call Dalymount a true home would draw in and the Fingal management will have been delighted with it.

Late on Fingal really upped the anty in search of goals and they were causing real problems for Maritimo. Just on 80 minutes Eamon Zayed had a perfect chance but his headed effort was JUST wide, and it was heart in mouth stuff whether you were one of the Fingal fans or one of the many Maritimo fans.

Only a minute later that famous win was back on the cards sending Dalymount Park into a total frenzy, After all his missed chances Eamon Zayed ran past 3 defenders and knocked the ball in the back of the net, great goal and it was game on with 10 minutes left and from there Fingal were all over Maritimo just exactly what they needed to finally settle the team, pity it had to take 80 minutes to do that.

The hope that Fingal would overcome the ods were almost short lived, Brendan Clarke rather stupidly came out of his goal to Kanu who was running towards him un marked, Clarke slipped at the vital moment and Kanu could have put it anywhere in the net he liked but where did he put it? WIDE it was a mystery to how he didnt score.

Maritimo made up for it only moments later and it was surely game over on 86 minutes as Maritimo caught Fingal on the break and Kanu calmly slotted the ball in past Clarke. It really was a dampner to what had turned into a very exciting last 10 minutes or so.

That goal just pushed Fingal even more and on 89 minutes there still was a glimmer of hope as Eamon Zayed grabbed a second goal, so easy for him, he just taped it past Peterson in the goal.

At the end of 90 minutes the fourth official showed 3 minutes of additional time which brought a massive roar of confidence from the Fingal fans who were singing and urging their team right from the word go, they really had played their part in the game but a famous historic come back just wasnt to be. Sporting Fingal join Dundalk and Bohemians in having a very short spell in Europe and you cant even begin to contemplate what financial implecations this will bring to all 3 clubs.

Fingal will find it tough going to pick themselves up from this defeat but will have to quickly as they face another daunting task on Saturday as they travel not too far to Richmond Park to take on league leaders St Pats.

Sporting Fingal: B Clarke, G O'Brien, L Fitzgerald, S Williams, S Maher, K Browne, C Byrne, R Finn, G Crowe, A Kirby, S McFaul SUBS; B Gannon, J Frost, O Cahill, K Dawson, C James,  E Zayed, D Quigley

CS Marítimo: Peterson Dos Santos Pecanha(GK), Alonso Ferreira de Matos, Robson Severino Silva, Ricardo Filipe Santos Esteves, Marco Aurielo Iubel, Roberto Sousa Rezende, Papa Babacar Diawara, Abdelmalek, Cherrad, Valdecir Souza Junior, Danilo Leandro Dias, Joao Guilherme Leme Amorin SUBS; Marcelo Boek, Elias Rosa, Dylan Duventru, Luis Miguel Olim Andrade, Nuno Miguel Pereira Da Sousa, Luciano Amaral Silva Alves, Philipe Fidelis Dos Santos

Daniel "Pitchside" Pitcher Twitter: @DanFM104Sport About: Dan "Pitchside" Pitcher provides insight and commentary as the chief soccer and rugby correspondent for Sportspeak.