NEW Athlone manager Tony Mannion had to settle for a point against reigning league champions Dundalk at St Mel's Park last night.
Despite dominating for long periods of the game, Athlone found the Dundalk defence too hard to unlock.
In the first half both Warren Parkes and Michael Collins went very close for Athlone. Dundalk's only real chance in that half fell to Joe Hanrahan who forced goalkeeper Shane Curran to give away a corner on the half hour.
Athlone had a great opportunity to go in front 11 minutes into the second half but the usually reliable Tommy Gaynor hesitated too much after he wrong footed Dundalk goalkeeper John Connolly and the chance was lost.
In the 73rd minute Curran had to get down well to save a glancing header from Mick Doohan after a corner. In between Peter Withnell should have done better than blast wide from a good scoring position inside the penalty box.
. Bray Wanderers increased their lead at the top of the First Division table to 12 points with a comfortable 3-0 win over bottom of the table Monaghan United as second placed Cobh Ramblers played out a scoreless draw with fourth in the table Home Farm Everton at St Colman's Park.
Derek O'Neill and Ritchie Parsons scored within five minutes of each other midway through the first half to put Bray in command at Gortakeegan.
Monaghan missed three glorious chances through Darren Smyth, Jonathan Fagan and Mark Ennis either side of half time before Ciaran O'Brien got Bray's third goal two minutes into injury time.
Home Farm Everton had Fran Hitchcock sent off for retaliation following a challenge on Cobh's Alan O'Neill after 47 minutes in the chief incident of their 0-0 draw.
The nearest either side went to scoring was in the 70th minutes when Home Farm's central defender Ian Woods headed a Martin Bayly free-kick against a post.
Elsewhere, St James's Gate and Waterford cancelled each other out in a 1-1 draw at Iveagh Grounds to virtually end their outside hopes of challenging for promotion.
Limerick beat Longford 4-1 at Strokestown Road to put a seven points gap between the sides and virtually consign Longford to reelection along with Monaghan.
