The Harps Board had released a statement on Wednesday appealling to the sporting community of Donegal to come out and support the club after having been forced to ask all staff members and players to take a 50 per cent pay cut between now and the season's end.

And while Friday night’s home crowd of approximately 1,000, would not have gone a long way to appeasing the board members, or indeed those whose wages have been halved, the defeat was certainly not helpful.

It's strange when one considers that 12 months ago almost 3,000 squeezed in to see Harps defeat Cobh Ramblers on the way to securing Premier Division football but the opportunity to preserve that status was, obviously, not considered as important by many last weekend.

Aside from the financial woes results from elsewhere certainly didn’t go Hegarty's way with all three teams below the Donegal men recording victories on Friday and Saturday.

Galway United defeated Cork City 3-2 and UCD won their first game after five successive losses when they took the points in a 1-0 win against Drogheda United at the Belfield Bowl, while Cobh Ramblers recorded a vital win over over Shamrock Rovers which moved them off the foot of the table. All in all, a seven-point advantage has now been shredded to four, with Galway still having a game in hand.

Tricky assignment

Next up for Harps is a tricky assignment at Turner's Cross in Cork, a ground where, over recent times, the only thing that the Donegal club has obtained is travel sickness!

But back to Friday night and the only goal of the game arrived six minutes into the second half when a neat interchange that involved Keith Fahey and Glen Fitzpatrick saw Mark Quigley win possession. After turning Declan Boyle, the striker placed to ball just inside James Gallagher's near post.

Six minutes later, with the alarm bells ringing, Johnny McDonnell's side had a chance to double their advantage from the penalty spot after Jonathan Minnock was adjudged to have fouled Ryan Guy. However, Gallagher got down low to his left to save well from Quigley's strike.

Chris Breen had two decent sights on goal, both of which followed passes from Conor Gethins. The first, after half an hour, was curled inches over the crossbar at the far post and the second, moments later, was driven low to the near post and Barry Ryan had to get down quickly to save.

The match's first real opening fell the way of Conor Gethins and having sneaked in between Jason Gavin and Jamie Harris, the striker, who was making his first start since the 1-0 loss at the hands of Derry City in the Brandywell in late August, trickled his shot just past the upright.

The Inchicore outfit, although playing well within themselves, were a lick of paint away when Ryan's cross brought indecision in the home defence.