AIRTRICITY LEAGUE PREMIER DIVISION Sligo Rovers 0 St Patrick's Athletic 0:ST PATRICK'S Athletic showed little after-effects from their Europa League game against Shakhtar Karagandy 48 hours earlier as they held high-flying Sligo Rovers to a scoreless draw at the Showgrounds on Saturday night.

Pete Mahon’s side had three gilt-edged chances to win the match in the first half but Daniel North failed to hit the target in the 25th and 26th minutes and again on the stroke of half-time after ample space opened up in front of goal.

Sligo’s only real chance of the game came in the 56th minute when Alan Kirby’s blistering 35-yard shot flew inches wide.

Saints goalkeeper Gary Rogers, who had a superb 90 minutes between the posts, had to react smartly to deny Eoin Doyle after four minutes of the first half.

Matthew Blinkhorn went close for Sligo on 20 minutes following an impressive move started at midfield by Joseph Ndo. Defences were on top in both halves with Conor Kenna, who had been out of action since the second game of the season, marshalling the Saints’ back four magnificently.

Paul Cooke was unhappy with his side’s lacklustre performance. “When you are on top of the league you have to put in a performance and you have to show life and desire all the things we never showed tonight” said Cooke.

An upbeat Mahon welcomed the draw. “A great result for us. We didn’t play with the same fluency as we did on Thursday night which sapped us emotionally and physically but I have to compliment our players, especially our back four who were magnificent,” said the pleased St Patrick’s boss.

SLIGO ROVERS: Clarke, Keane, Peers, Ryan, McGuinness, Greene, Ndo, Blinkhorn (Powell, 59 mins), Cretaro (Dillon, 60 mins) , Kirby (Russell, 69 mins), Doyle.

ST PATRICK'S ATHLETIC: Rogers, Pender, Bermingham, Kenna (Shortall, 61 mins), Guthrie, McFall, Kavanagh (Daly, 68 mins) Bradley, Murphy (D McMillan, 63 mins), North, Mulcahy.

Referee: D Hancock(Cork).