Slow starts proving costly

IN his first match with the captain’s armband, Bevan Duffy had the battle scars to prove he’d led from the frontline on Sunday.

However, while he felt Longford were lucky to make it to the end with 15 men, it was his teammate Andy McDonnell who inflicted the most damage. ‘THERE was nothing really in the first one to be honest, it was Andy who caught me, so I don’t think there was any need to be questioning any of the Longford lads.

‘BUT In the second-half I was caught by one that I thought the referee should have looked at. It was clear as day that I was stuck, but the referee didn’t seem to think that it was an issue. But that’s neither here nor there really. As far as referee goes, I actually thought he was good.’

Duffy was more inclined to lo closer to home for explanations.

‘Every game we’ve played this year has been like that, even challenge matches. Slow start, slow first halves and just leaving ourselves a lot of work to do. It doesn’t help having lads sent off either, that sort of makes the challenge even harder.

‘We need to get the start sorted. We won the toss and decided to go with the wind. It wasn’t to be, we were reckless with the ball we were turning over too easy, we were kicking bad wides, we were making bad decisions. And, like I said, that’s been happening throughout pre-season.

‘I think we were three down with the advantage of the wind. Look they got a sloppy goal, I think it was a miss-kick that dropped it in to the square and they got a fist on it. But we have to be more clinical and use the ball a lot better and hold on to the ball better. When you turn the ball over you’re going to get punished. When you’re playing in to the breeze and turning the ball over you’re not taking advantage of the possession and it’s costing you points.’

Louth produced a better second-half display, but Duffy insists they will have to improve for Saturday’s trip to Croke Park to face Laois.

‘We battled well. Our backs were against the wall and we stuck it out. We showed a lot of fight in that second half. We got our act together as far as holding on to the ball and decision making went. We worked hard on the kick-outs, Fergal is very good at them, if you find a bit of space he’ll pretty much put it in to you. So credit to the lad, there were a lot of debuts out there and I thought they did really well. But it’s a big game next week now.’