Drogs ⚽ Derry ⚽ Dundalgan

Anthony McIntyre ⚽ The seasons are changing.

For long enough we could leave Weaver Park at the end of a game in brightness. Yesterday evening, darkness was descending on a warmer than usual October day as we made our way into the stadium. The stewards kept a watchful eye for flares given the ban slapped on travelling Drogs fans to Tallaght in a fortnight’s time where title chasing Shamrock Rovers are the formidable opposition. It was a game we had planned to go to but that looks to be up in the air at the minute. An appeal has been lodged against the ban imposed after Drogheda's defeat to Dundalk in the Louth derby last week where a match official was allegedly hit with a flare, but the use of flares at last night’s encounter by Drogheda Ultras will merely illuminate the problem for the Appeals panel.

Someone amongst the small contingent of Derry fans too had a flare up moment which saw one of the incendiary projectiles land on the pitch once the game was over and the field vacated. It could only have been fired in anger and not in celebration. Derry’s failure to secure a win last night has put a serious dent in their title aspirations. They now trail Shamrock Rovers by four points and have played a game more. That could easily turn into a unassailable 7 point advantage for the Hoops.

Minus some tough tackles and several fine saves, it was pretty much a flat affair, a competition in which the man of the match was the oldest player on the pitch, Drogheda’s Gary Deegan. The captain certainly steadied the ship and guided it through. Still, I thought the player who made the difference was Andrew Wogan in nets. This teenage keeper I fear will not be in Drogs colours for long. His future seems certain to lie at a higher level of the sport.

Drogheda can rest now knowing that they will be in the top flight against next season. Even an injury time sending off for Conor Keeley for a tactical foul which earned him a second yellow, could do nothing to upend that.

We had barely taken our seats in the usual spot perched just above the halfway line when a text came through from a former republican prisoner in Belfast promising to keep me up to speed on the Linfield-Glentoran game being played out at Windsor Park. When I told I was at the Weavers Park match he quipped ‘hip flask and all’. At least somebody reads my post-match ramblings.

The North being the North where things that don’t have the same significance elsewhere very much matter there, led him to observe:

Just listening to the players’ names for both teams and there doesn’t seem to be many steel rods on either team! A few seasons ago Linfield had 8 Taigs on their starting 22 . . . changing times.

For those of us old enough the remember the Jimmy Young ditty I'm the Only Catholic in the Linfield Team, a Bob Dylan song comes to mind, The Times They Are a-Changin. Down here, nobody much cares what the religious composition of a soccer side is – apart from perhaps the far right who trade in the currency of hatred. Muslim sounding names would send the defenders of the one true faith into rabid and rapid rage with accompanying DNR signage, they enjoy their hatred so much.

By coincidence, I was also texting a former blanket man in Derry about the Drogheda game. He immediately got back to me with the score! Our passion for soccer has survived the H Blocks.

It is an achievement to have reached the end of this piece, having to overcome the winding up from my friend Leanne who messaged me on Facebook throughout. For her, it defies belief that somebody can write match reports first thing in the morning, having consumed a hip flask of Dundalgan whiskey the night before. She is gamely hanging onto a cup of coffee trying to kickstart her day while I am going at it like a Duracell bunny. Thing is, Drogheda don't need to be top of the league, just still in it, to make me top of the morning.

⏩Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.