ASHFORD ROVERS
A HEAVING trophy cabinet is on Clifton Conyard’s radar in 2017/18. Ashford Rovers may have defended the Wicklow Cup last season but the Ballinalea Park boss felt his side could and should have won more and he wants to make amends by next summer.
Conyard isn’t getting bogged down by the structure of the top flight this season – he doesn’t care who is or isn’t in it as long as it is his captain lifting the trophy by April or May.
“Looking forward to the league. The lads can’t wait to get going.
“I hope we challenge in all competitions.
“We did last season, we lost four or five league games and all by one league goal where we could have won any of them. In the Charlie Bishop Cup, we lost on penalties and in the Jim McLaughlin Premier we lost in extra time and we won the Wicklow Cup.
“We did challenge in every competition, just hope to go further this season.
“Well I think there’s only five teams in the Premier so that’s not great no two ways about it but to be honest Ashford Rovers don’t care. If there’s five teams or 20 teams, we’re going to give it 100% to be the winners.”
Rovers’ second side will compete in the second tier alongside clubs from the Leinster Football League.
Conyard isn’t bowled away by the concept but he feels the blame should not lie at the feet of the Wicklow League.
“As for the Leinster sides in Division 1, I don’t know about it.
“I’d personally rather see two divisions in Wicklow than teams coming in.
“Lots of Division 1 teams might not want to travel up to Dublin. I know our ‘B’ team aren’t that keen on it as they have a lot of youths from last season on it.
“The Wicklow League are trying and it’s not easy for them – it’s hard to find the solution. The FAI shouldn’t allow teams to leave their jurisdiction to bigger leagues while the smaller counties struggle because of it.”
But what Conyard wants above all else is to have a fixture to look forward to every weekend – Jack Frost not withstanding.
“I hope the season runs smoothly – no stop-starts. I hope we get games week in, week out. Obviously we can’t do anything about the weather but last February and March I think we had one game in a six week period and only one of those weeks was weather related.
“It’s very hard to keep lads going when they’re training more than they play. I’d rather play week in, week out and finish earlier than go weeks without a game.”