It may have taken a few weeks to get right, but the Saint Patrick's Athletic jigsaw is certainly starting to look like the completed picture. This, their best performance of the campaign so far, earned them a first home win and the Premier Division leadership. A Dundalk side that hadn't lost for two months was simply left to wonder what might have been.

Had the visitors looked for an opener with the same tenacity which they showed over the closing 25 minutes while chasing the game, the points, as both managers were to admit afterwards, might have been anybody's.

As it was, Dundalk's late surge turned an entertaining duel into a compelling one, with Raymond Campbell causing a lot of problems out wide on the right. But the striking partnership of Peter Withnell and Brian Byrne failed to come up with the required finish around the area.

True, Byrne looked to have a decent penalty claim with four minutes remaining, when a combination of Trevor Wood and Packie Lynch flattened the striker after he had delivered a header from just inside the area.

But an equaliser at that point would surely have been an injustice, given that for the bulk of the game the home side had looked to be much the better side; and they, too, had had cause to be displeased with the referee.

It's not entirely clear when things started to go wrong for Aidan O'Regan, but that he had managed to book four players in a first half almost entirely devoid of a rough challenge hinted that it might be one of his less distinguished afternoons. Worse, however, was to come.

If the Corkman had suffered from a bout of whistlemania early on, he did finally start to show signs of letting the game flow early in the second half. Six minutes in, he wisely ignored an offside flag at the Dundalk end and waved play on with Jim McLaughlin's side safely in possession. Moments later, he repeated the trick when a ball from the right caught a player in the centre too far forward, and the intended target, Paul Osam, having seen the linesman, had pulled up just short of the area.

Campbell, the man who had chased back, clearly thought it was a free and knocked the ball forward for the kick, whereupon the Saint Patrick's midfielder stepped up and slipped it past Steve Williams and into the net. Now, however, and to the complete disbelief of the locals, O'Regan decided to signal for the free.

Had the incident had a genuine effect on the result, it would surely have haunted O'Regan for some time. As it turned out, though, Pat Dolan's side were to get the breakthrough they needed 12 minutes later, when a free on the right was pushed quickly to Willie Burke, who carried it crossfield. The full-back then set Eddie Gormley through on the left, from where a marvellous cross found Ian Gilzean with a great deal of time to pick his spot.

The lead was well deserved, for the Saints had largely run the show in the first half, passing the ball neatly through midfield where Gormley was outstanding and Thomas Morgan wasn't too far behind.

Up front, Trevor Molloy was the greatest beneficiary of his team-mates' movement, and a handful of chances, three of them in the first 10 minutes, fell to the young striker, although on each occasion he failed to find the target.