TRIBE CRUISE BUT SHEFFLIN WANTS MORE
GALWAY may have romped home by 23 points in their opening Allianz League Division 1B but manager Henry Shefflin says improvement will be needed heading to Tipperary next weekend.
His men dominated the secondhalf against the wind to put an understrength Westmeath side to the sword but Shefflin says they need to do more.
“We will have to be much better than this heading to Tipperary. That’s what we need to work on this week, there’s plenty to improve on,” said Shefflin.
Galway, having beefed up the side which lost the Walsh cup final to Wexford by making 11 changes, eased their way to a facile victory despite still being without their St Thomas’ contingent at Pearse Stadium.
It would have been more if not for the heroics of superb Westmeath goalkeeper Noel Conaty (inset) who produced at least half a dozen saves including stopping a penalty.
But Galway did enough in front of a crowd of less than 1,000 to lead by nine at the break, with Evan Niland hitting 0-6, two of them from play.
Seven Galway players found the target in the opening half but they didn’t have it all their own way and Westmeath trailed by just 0-7 to 0-4 at the end of the opening quarter.
Conaty denied interval substitute Jamie Ryan just after the break but two more from Niland and a second from Gavin Lee pushed Galway 0-18 to 0-06 clear before they finally got a goal when Donal O’shea floated in a high ball and Jason Flynn flicked it home.
Flynn then bore down on goal and had an effort parried but wing-back Cianan Fahy had come forward and finished low to the net to make it 2-23 to 0-7 after 55 minutes.
Flynn got his second goal ten minutes from time and the rout was completed two minutes from time when sub Conor Whelan raced in and blasted a trademark shot to the top right corner to get their campaign off to a flying start and set up their trip to Thurles next weekend. SCORERS - GALWAY: E Niland 0-11 (0-6f, 0-1 ’65), J Flynn 2-2 (0-1f), T Monaghan 0-5, C Fahy 1-1, G Lee 0-4, C Whelan 1-0, D O’shea 0-2, D Mcloughlin 0-2, J Cooney 0-1, D Morrissey 0-1, J Ryan 0-1, R Glennon 0-1. WESTMEATH: D Williams 0-7 (0-6f), D O’reilly 0-2, D Clinton 0-1, N Mitchell 0-1, M Cunningham 0-1.