THE LAST POINT: A shocking way to win or lose!

So that was what that felt like! Just a week after Leitrim produced their own Houdini moment against Wexford, the Green & Gold were on the receiving end of the proverbial kick in the teeth last Sunday down in Netwatch Cullen Park leaving anyone with Green & Gold in their hearts stunned and bewildered.

Got to be honest, it is not a nice feeling as the vastly outnumbered home support suddenly found their voice and how! Hollering, jumping and roaring, and that was just in the Press Box, you could hardly blame the Carlow fans for we did much the same when Ryan O'Rourke converted his penalty to stun Wexford in Avant Money Pairc Sean Mac Diarmada.

Carlow are much like ourselves; these sort of days don't come along too often and after a few years suffering at the hands of the Green & Gold, they celebrated an unlikely victory with great relish. It is amazing what a win does for the confidence - a week ago, it was Leitrim looking ahead confidently as new horizons opened up before them, now it is Carlow on something of a high as they face into next Saturday's derby clash with Wexford, their chances of promotion back on.

The baffled looks on the faces of Leitrim supporters, never mind the players and management, spoke of fans trying to make sense of what they had witnessed and  harkened back to sickening days like Roscommon and David O'Connor goal in  2003 or, even worse, Galway 1995 and Sean Og de Paor raiding to dump the reigning Connacht champions out of the championship. It truly was that crushing, as victory, nestling in the palm of your hand and rising hopes of a real tilt at promotion, was ripped away with all the finesse of a sledgehammer.

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I don't know if it ranked as any consolation but the second half performance was the best sustained display this Leitrim team had turned in all year. It was everything we believed Andy Moran's side could produce - attacking with pace, defending with zeal and moving the ball with purpose and intent.

So it is bewildering that, on a day when they got so much right, Leitrim got hit by Colm Hulton's sucker punch just as the clock hit 40 minutes and three seconds. One Wexford supporter posted “karma for last week” underneath the Observer report on the game, only illustrating just how much the defeat a week beforehand still stings down in the Model County. 

To be honest, karma doesn't come into it - if it did Leitrim would have a lot more dramatic wins to their name over the years but it does illustrate the fatalism and superstitious nature of sports fans, the notion that a fortunate result one week will come back to haunt you the next! Although if you talk to any Meath fan, the ghost of the ‘ghost goal’ against Louth back in 2010 has assumed mythic proportions at this stage.

The only question now is how do Leitrim get back on the horse, so to speak, after such an horrendous fall? Does it help or hinder us that we have a derby coming full speed at us next Sunday against Longford? Can you put a defeat such as what we endured in Netwatch Cullen Park behind you that quickly or does the performance reinforce the belief that we're far from out of it?

Pessimism prompts doom and gloom but if you start looking at the games left in the division, there is a horrid amount of football still left to be played. Just look at the final three rounds left to be played and you can see that nothing is certain!

• Round 5: Laois v  London; Carlow v Wexford; Longford v Leitrim;  Tipperary v Waterford
• Round 6: London v Waterford; Laois v Leitrim; Tipperary v Wexford; Longford v Carlow
• Round 7: Wexford v Longford; Leitrim v Tipperary; Waterford v Laois; Carlow v London

The banana skin potential is high over the final three rounds and teams that are seemingly out of it right now could quickly come back into contention if results go their way - keep an eye out for dark horses Tipperary after they pushed Laois all the way last Sunday while I'm not sure that the O'Moore County side are as impregnable as we all think, Carlow outplaying them for the first half in their encounter and Tipp missing a penalty.

Teams will take points off each other, the stakes are getting higher and that does play it's part if last Sunday was anything to go by. The first half was as devoid of hope or excitement as you could imagine as both Leitrim and Carlow played with a nervousness and inhibition that spoke of teams letting the pressure get to them.

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The second half was transformed and strangely, it took a mistake to fire Leitrim into high gear, or rather two mistakes from consecutive kickouts that led to 1-1 for Carlow, the goal particularly painful as Mark Diffley was dispossessed and Jamie Clarke tapped the ball into an empty net from 25 yards.

But that seemed to release whatever was holding Leitrim back as the Green & Gold surged forwards in waves - Ryan O'Rourke's goal was a wonderful effort that breathed new life into his teammates and even if Carlow, stubborn and resilient, refused to back down, there was a sense that momentum was very much with the Green & Gold.

Some few vignettes from an enthralling second half ....

• Barry McNulty, defying what looked like a badly twisted ankle at the end of the first half, truly is becoming the driving force of this team
• Ryan & Darragh pose a potent  threat to any team and while Rooney will have regrets over a free that dropped short late on, the deadly duo are capable of opening up any defence
• Nevin O'Donnell may get a few brickbats for Carlow's calamitous first goal but he made a Gordon Banks-esque save just a matter of minutes beforehand.
• Colm Hulton saved Carlow at both ends of the field, his match winning thunderbolt  matched by a goal-line clearance from Barry McNulty just five minutes into the game.
• m Quite a bit of talk that Leitrim should have been more cynical and pulled down any of the Carlow players for the late goal. In fairness, Carlow had the space and pace over that side of the field, the footage gives the impression defenders were much closer than they were and  more likely Leitrim were caught out of shape after the dismissal of Conor Reynolds seconds earlier and hadn't readjusted their shape.
• Interesting comment from Andy Moran that perhaps Leitrim's wild abandon that got them back into the game and into a match winning position might have cost them in the closing stages when a more clinical and cold approach might have taken the sting from Carlow.
• Another game where the opposition caused problems for Leitrim with their hard running. It is a recurring problem in  this campaign as Carlow's diesel engines punched huge holes in the Leitrim defence.

Strangest of all, I'd be more optimistic of Leitrim's chances for promotion, even if it remains a devilishly difficult task,  after Sunday's defeat than I was before because the Green & Gold started to play how we know they can - go figure that one out if you can!

Finally, congratulations to Leitrim Ladies on reaching the Lidl LGFA Division 4 Semi-Finals with a game to spare. They may have been odds on to do so but Jonny Garrity's injury hit team still had to perform under pressure and they did so with Ailbhe Clancy setting the game on fire with six points off the bench in the second half.

If the men's team think they've had it hard trying to get out of Division 4, the Ladies have twice lost finals and one semi-final after extra-time in their last three campaigns so with the help of God, lady luck will shine on them in their semi-final this year.