Kelly upbeat about Louth’s promotion bid

AFTER what was likely to be one of the most trying weekends of his lengthy and distinguished career, Colin Kelly remains upbeat about Louth’s promotion prospects.

The Reds’ boss opted to take his place in the dugout for Louth’s crucial clash with Armagh, despite the sad passing of his mother Celine just three days earlier.

Armagh boss Kieran McGeeney insisted that football has to be ‘put in context’ at times like that, and praised his opposite number for leading his team out. ‘I’m sure it’s been a trying few days for Colin and I’m sure it was very hard to come here and get involved in a game.’

However, despite the circumstances and the heavy defeat that transpired, Kelly tried to look at the positives.

‘We’re still in a good position,’ he insisted. ‘It’s a tough division, but it’s still very much in our own hands.

‘There’s three teams now that can get promoted, Louth, Armagh and Tipperary - I would have taken that at the start of the year.

‘Today was one of our worst performances. The lads know that and I know that and we don’t have to be told how bad it was. But we’ll re-group on Tuesday night and look forward to next Sunday.’

Kelly should have Andy McDonnell and Jim McEneaney available for selection and he too stressed that football has to be kept in perspective when revealing the reason behind Lima Dullaghan’s absence on Sunday.

‘Liam’s child was taken ill overnight so hopefully all is well there - that’s a lot more important than what went on out there for 70 minutes.’

The Sean O’Mahony’s man’s absence meant that from the team that started the opening fixture against Laois, Louth were without their centre-half, midfielder and full forward, but Kelly wasn’t offering that as an excuse.

‘That’s what a squad is for and we have the players to cover. Kevin Carr has come in for Liam Dullaghan and he was exceptional in the first three games, so were we worried about Kevin Carr coming in? Absolutely not.

‘When you’re playing at this level you’re going to have injuries so it’s just about getting on with the job.

‘We were second best in every position. They looked fitter, they looked stronger but it was just one poor performance and we’ll regroup.’

While Armagh now look like the form team in the promotion race, Kelly scoffed at the idea that they were a ‘step up’ for his Louth team.

‘I think that’s an injustice to the opposition that we have played. It’s a crazy question. Sligo were beaten today and they took points off Armagh. They were a step up today but they’re in Division 3 the same as us and I wouldn’t be jumping up and down about them winning Ulster titles.’

The Orchard County inflicted most of the damage in the opening quarter and Louth were chasing the game thereafter.

Both sides had players sent off early on, but Kelly wasn’t overly surprised.

‘It was a bit topsy turvy with the sending off. They were coming at us and it was hard to handle. Then Anthony got sent off which was indiscipline and I spoke to him about it at half-time. He’s been one of our better performers, he’s a top-class player, but the one thing we spoke about today was red cards and not getting involved in silly stuff.

‘We can’t talk about referees but we have experienced this man before in the same fixture two years ago and Louth people know what happened that night so I didn’t have too much faith in our 15 seeing out the 70 minutes,’ he added.