Premier

Showgrounds
06 Oct 2018

Bray Wanderers were tonight relegated to the First Division for next season, with three games still to play.

The Seagulls succumbed to Sligo Rovers as the Bit o' Red secured their position in the top flight with goals from Caolan McAleer and Mikey Drennan bracketing a Jake Ellis equaliser.

Ex-Seagulls Rogers and Shields
hold Dundalk's Championship flag

With the cheers from Oriel Park dying away overnight, the drama at the bottom of the table took over, and produced an end of season classic, with all the goals scored in a five minute spell coming up to a quarter of an hour into the second period.

Bray's pre-match plans took a blow before kick-off when Jamie Crilly was forced to stand down to the bench, having been named to start.

And there was a further problem within minutes of the start, with Dragos Mamaliga having to be brought into play for Dylan Hayes.

With President Michael D Higgins in attendance (to mark the hosts' 90th anniversary, rather than the Seagulls demise), the game then followed form for the visitors as Sligo notched up only their third home win of the season.

Mícheál Ó hUanacháin

Bray Wanderers: 40 Mark O’Connor; 4 Conor Kenna, 15 Darragh Gibbons, 25 Cian Walsh, 3 Kevin Lynch; 12 Dylan Hayes, 6 Paul O’Conor, 8 John Sullivan , 22 Darragh Noone; 24 Jake Ellis , 8 Ger Pender
Subs: 14 Rhys Gorman, 16 Glen Hollywood, 26 Byron O'Gorman (for Pender 85), 27 Dragos Mamaliga (for Hayes 8 inj), 29 Evan Moran (gk), 30 Jamie Crilly
Sligo Rovers: 1 Ed McGinty; 2 Kyle Callan-McFadden, 5 John Mahon , 6 Patrick McClean, 3 Regan Donelon; 4 David Cawley, 8 Rhys McCabe ; 7 Caolan McAleer , 11 Lee Lynch, 10 Lewis Morrison; 9 Mikey Drennan
Subs: 12 Liam Kerrigan (for McAleer 81), 13 Adam Wixted, 14 Darren Collins (for Morrison 62), 16 Mitchell Beeney, 17 Kris Twardek, 18 Seamus Sharkey, 18 Raff Cretaro (for Lynch 88)
Referee: John McLoughlin