Gilsenan hoping Glyde can make their Mark

ROOKIE boss Mark Gilsenan, right, would be the first to admitt that he set himself up for a baptism of fire last winter when he agreed to fill the Glyde Rangers hotseat.

Just a decade after reaching a senior semi-final the Tallanstown outfit slipped into the basementt grade in league and championship,- but that didn’t put thee Monaghan native off when he wass encouraged by fellow Ardee CCC teacher Peter Duffy to throw hiss hat in the ring.

‘I would have been a selector with my own club Corduff bringing a team up from underage, but this would have been my first manager job.

‘I looked after the Ardee teams for the past few years and a good few of the Glyde lads came through the school during that time, so I had fair idea of the talent that was there.

‘Peter said they were looking for a manager and asked would I sit down with them, so I said why not?

‘Morale was low, but the talent was always there. They were relegated in league and championmen ship, but they

were miss- ing key menchampionmen and the season before the went down dragged on well into the winter due to an appeal, so they only had about four weeks off going into 2016.

‘That all took it’s toll in the end and when you get on a slippery slope it’s hard to recover.’

In stark contrast to the travails of 2016 , Glyde are undefeated this term under Gilsenan.

‘You have to hand it to the lads they really responded to the adversity. I think if you include the winter league [Kevin Mullen Shield], they have played 21, won 20 and drawn one, so that’s bad.’

While everything went pretty much to plan in the championship upu to the semi-final, the ease with which Glyde dispatched Roche Emmets took everyone by surprise and will see them start Sunday’s final as favourites.

But their manager sees it a bit differently.d

‘Yeah I’ve heard people saying i that, but I don’t know. Glen Emmets have been in a couple of finals in recent years and they’ve been Division 2 this year where every game was a really good test for them.

‘A lot of our games were very one-sided which is the nature of Division 3.’

In fact, Gilsenan feels that winning promotion was probably just as important as clinching Christy Bellew on Sunday.

‘A few of the lads that are getting closer to retirement probably see the championship as the big one because they have never won one, but playing at a higher level week in, week out is so imprtant for the younger lads coming through, so that was our first big goal and thankfully we achieved that.

‘But look, we want to win on Sunday too. That would be the icing on the cake.’