Roscommon enjoyed a surprisingly facile victory over Cavan at Breffni Park, 0-16 to 0-5.

The result moves the Division Three winners into the second round of the Qualifiers, while Cavan's year has come to a very disappointing end.

There were only five points scored during the course of a dour first half (which was marred by heavy rainfall and dreadful playing conditions) with the visitors taking a 0-3 to 0-2 advantage into the interval.

It wasn't until the 16th minute that one of the umpires got to reach for his flag, when Diarmaid Murtagh gave the Rossies the lead. Cathal Cregg made it 0-2 to no score after 21 minutes.

Martin Reilly finally got the Breffni County up and running with a great long range point seven minutes from the break and Enda Smith restored Roscommon's two-point advantage just after the half-hour mark.

Two minutes from the short whistle, Eugene Keating curled over a superb Cavan score.

John Evans' charges made an electric start to the second half with points from Murtagh (free) and Smith (2) to assume a four-point cushion after 41 minutes.

The winners would reel off a total of eight points without reply as they took a firm grip on proceedings: Conor Daly, Cregg (2), Murtagh and Smith - his fourth - hitting the target to make it 0-11 to 0-2 after 15 minutes of the second half.

Mickey Argue finally notched Cavan's first score of the second half at the three-quarters stage but the rampant victors responded with further points from Daly and Murtagh before Smith cancelled out Phillip Tinnelly's score: 0-15 to 0-4 after 67 minutes.

Reilly pulled back another consolation point for Terry Hyland's out-of-sorts side a minute from the end of normal time but Donie Smith closed the scoring for the winners in stoppage time. No need for extra time here...

Roscommon - D O'Malley; S McDermott, N Carty, N Collins; D Keenan, N Daly, C Cafferkey; C Shine, K Higgins; D O'Gara, E Smth (0-4), C Daly (0-2); S Kilbride, C Cregg (0-3, 1f), D Murtagh (0-5, 3f). Subs: R Stack for D Keenan, D Smith (0-2) for D O'Gara, M Nally for C Daly, I Kilbride for E Smith, M Finneran for K Higgins, C Murtagh for D Murtagh.

Cavan - C Gilsenan; J McLoughlin, K Brady, F Flanagan; J Hayes, J McEnroe, R Maloney Derham; D O'Reilly, G McKiernan; M Argue (0-1), M Lyng, N McDermott; J Brady, E Keating (0-1), M Reilly (0-2). Subs: M McKeever for J Hayes, D Givney for M Lyng, P Tinnelly (0-1) for R Maloney Derham, T Mooney for N McDermott, N Murray for K Brady, T Corr for M Argue.

Refreee - B Cassidy. Tweet

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