Raheens crash out of Leinster Championship as 14-man Kilanerin edge to narrow win

Kilanerin(Wexford)   0-10 Raheens                       0-8 Leinster IFC quarter-final Raheens went into this clash with Wexford intermediate champions Kilanerin as massive favourites in the eyes of the bookmakers, but some wasteful second half finishing and a strong conclusion to the game from 14-man Kilanerin ensured that the Kildare club fell at the first hurdle on their Leinster Championship sojourn. Coming up against a side who had already brushed the cobwebs off by winning a preliminary round game against Longford opposition was always going to be a difficult task for a Raheens outfit that hadn't played a competitive game in four weeks, and while they didn't look as free-flowing as usual in the first half, they managed to engineer a 0-5 to 0-4 half-time advantage. Wexford legend Matty Forde lined out at centre-forward for Kilanerin, and it was he who opened the scoring with a free early on, but Alan Igoe and Paddy Woodgate replied with points from placed balls to give Raheens the lead. A somewhat stop/start first half saw plenty of niggly off the ball incidents, but scores from David Fitzpatrick, David Malone and Rory Hannick saw them into the break with a slender advantage. It remained similarly tight upon the restart, and Kilanerin pegged the Kildare club back each time they edged in front, with Rory Donnelly, Malone and Liam Power all posting scores for the visitors before Colm Kavanagh's point 10 minutes from time levelled things up at 0-8 apiece. The hosts then lost Forde to a red card with six minutes left, but rather then powering on from that point, Raheens dropped off as Peter Hughes and Niall Hughes raised white flags on the run in to edge the Wexford men to a narrow victory. Raheens kicked eight second half wides in a frustrating display as they failed to fully spark to life, and their loss means that Moorefield are now the only Kildare club in either code left in the provincial championships.