FAI Cup semi-final
Galway 0 Bohs 1
"It wasn’t good enough from Neil [Doyle] and in the first half it wasn’t good enough from us."
The sentiment expressed by assistant manager Ollie Horgan summed up the emotions in Galway after a tough FAI Cup semi-final exit against Bohemians.
An uncharacteristically sluggish start to the game and a late penalty claim that was dismissed were singled out as the reasons his side came up just short.
Horgan acknowledged that, "Bohs in the first half were the better side. They hit the post twice. It looked like we had weathered the storm to half-time not playing well."
But Dylan Connolly netted on the stroke of half-time to put the visitors ahead. The game took another turn on the hour mark when Kacper Radkowski was dismissed.
That decision irked Bohemians but the Galway post-match reaction was dominated by Neil Doyle’s decision not to punish Keith Buckley for a pull in the box on Stephen Walsh.
"Neil is a top-class referee but he got that badly wrong. I’ve bit my tongue over the years. Moral victories are no good. I’ve had more moral victories than anyone in this country.
"It would have taken the game to extra-time where it would have been 11 v 10. There is no point in saying it wasn’t a penalty.
"I’ve bit my tongue over 10 years. But I am at a different club here where at least you can speak the truth in it. He [Neil Doyle] got it wrong. He is top class but he may as well be out of the academy missing that.
"You’ve got to get them right. If I didn’t get that right in Ballybofey, I would be out the door, as happened in the end when we got relegated."
Despite his obvious frustration, Horgan did retain perspective.
"However, that is not the reason we lost the game. We didn’t deal with
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