Setanta Cup/ Drogheda United 0 Linfield 1: They take understandable pride around United Park these days from being able to call themselves "champions of Ireland" but football's established pecking order is not easily disrupted and so a successful defence of the Setanta Cup is not quite top of the club's priority list for the coming season.
With Ollie Cahill, Stuart Byrne and Aidan O'Keeffe making competitive debuts, the home support came to last night's encounter with Linfield looking for evidence that Paul Doolin has added the sort of quality required to secure a precious first league title, but there wasn't quite the reassurance they were looking for in a narrow defeat that puts a serious if not fatal dent in the club's hopes of reaching this season's semi-finals.
True, the former Shelbourne pair did well enough, with Cahill looking especially lively but up front it was a somewhat familiar tale with frustration for O'Keeffe and his new team-mates as United's ability to turn chances created into goals remained a significant problem.
Linfield, of course, are very capable opponents for this very early stage of the new campaign and their strike-rate north of the border this season is more than twice that managed by their hosts down south last year.
With seven of the side that beat Donegal Celtic 3-0 at the weekend, the northerners looked happy at times to get bodies behind the ball while looking to hit United on the break. In every area of the pitch, however, they had players of considerable quality and only late on, as they desperately chased an equalising goal, did the home side manifestly get the upper hand.
Still, their superiority through the closing quarter of an hour and the chances they created with only compound the disappointment felt by Doolin that they could not take even a point from this opening group game.
United created a couple of half chances early on but neither Paul Keegan's free nor Cahill's low drive from just outside the area was quite good enough to force Alan Mannus into a save.
In contrast, the northerners hit the target with virtually their first serious attempt, although Aidan O'Kane's goal on the half hour from five yards owed a good deal to the hesitancy of Brian Shelley who really should have cleared after the Linfield midfielder's initial attempt to control Steven Douglas's cross.
More than a dozen Linfield players have scored in competitive games of one sort or another this season and the goal, O'Kane's third, added some urgency to the attempts of United's players to get off the mark. Almost immediately afterwards, they came close with Simon Webb's corner taking a touch from O'Keeffe and a couple of deflections before Mannus made a scrambled save on his line.
By the break, though, the hosts were a little fortunate not to be two down, with Peter Thompson, during time added on for an early injury to Shane Barrett, providing Matt Dickson with the sort of opportunity the 25-year-old would generally pounce on against Irish League opposition.
In pursuit of an equaliser Doolin brought on Tony Grant early in the second half and then replaced his first substitute, O'Keeffe, with Declan O'Brien. The club's cult striker almost scored with his first touch, obliging Mannus to tip a curling long-range effort from some 30 yards but on that, as on several subsequent occasions, the defence did enough between them to keep their lead intact.
DROGHEDA UNITED: Connor; Shelley, Gavin, Gartland, Webb; Robinson, Byrne, Keegan, Cahill; Ristilla (Grant, 54 mins), Barrett (O'Keeffe, 6 mins; O'Brien, 68 mins).
LINFIELD: Mannus; Douglas, Lindsay, Murphy, McCann; Dickson, McAreavey, Downey, O'Kane; Stewart (Thompson, 77 mins), Thompson.
Referee: A Kelly(Cork).
