With New York only fiveweeks away, this Sunday is ideal formorale boost
PRIDE of place this week goes to the under 21 footballers who reached the Connacht final after going into the Lion’s Den of Kiltoom and turned over Roscommon for the first time since 1996.
While not a vintage performance they did enough to grind out victory while never in my mind reaching their full potential. Not often a Sligo team can win a Connacht semi- final and still have plenty more in them. Certainly if I was the Galway manager our final opponents watching our game, I feel he will be confident his side can get the win after their impressive victory over last year’s all Ireland winners Mayo.
In last Wednesday’s game we struggled to get our big players on the ball and it took four outstanding points from Darragh Cummins from long range which took out Roscommon’s organised defence that enabled Sligo to take charge of the game.
The positive for Sligo manager Paul Taylor is his side will be going in under the radar and has home advantage next Saturday evening in Markievicz Park where Galway will be firm favourites. The big plus for these players and management is that this squad is one of the most experienced sides from a Sligo perspective ever at this level when you look at some of their previous form, such as a host of players that have won Senior County medals, Connacht minor league medals, played in a Connacht minor final, won Connacht Colleges at Senior level, played in an All- Ireland semi- final and have played at Senior County level with Sligo. While this Galway team are of high quality I feel if we can reach our potential we can claim our first under 21 title ironically in the last year of this competition, what a story that would be.
Now back to the seniors’ disappointing display last Sunday against Offaly. This was an absolute must win for Offaly and to be fair to them they deserved their win which gives them a real chance of avoiding relegation. While I’m sure Sligo manager Niall Carew will be disappointed that his side didn’t get the two points but will surely be more annoyed/ worried about the level of performance from his side and the fact we are not yet mathematically safe from relegation. We now travel across the country to take on the surprise packet of division three Louth whom have already have achieved promotion up to Division two next year after defeating Tipperary in Thurles. This now leaves a winner take all game between Armagh and Tipperary to see who will join Louth next year in the higher division.
Now back to our own situation where by my calculation we have to avoid anything over a thirteen point defeat to retain our divisional status, or that there is a no drawn game in the matches between Antrim v Longford and Laois and Offaly. Once again this year in division three it demonstrates the evenness of all teams who with one game to go all have their own destiny in their hands where a win will keep them safe from relegation or in Armagh and Tipperary’s case get them promoted, with only Louth out of the eight teams having nothing to play for.
After a very promising start to the league where it looked like we were going to be involved in the promotion race we have fallen away badly over the last couple of weeks. What is now important is making sure of matters next week with a better performance and concentrate on the banana skin that is New York. As Louth are already promoted it will be interesting to see will they give a run to their bench or try to keep their momentum going. I’m not sure if from our point of view, is it better playing against the first fifteen who have nothing to play for or playing a second fiddle team who are trying to make a name for themselves.
With New York only five weeks away from next Sunday this game is the ideal preparation to get a confidence fix with a moral boosting win. Win or not I would like to see a performance full of energy, enthusiasm and work- rate along the lines of our performance against Tipperary in Thurles a number of weeks ago, where we attacked with pace and purpose and defended resolutely with huge intensity. This game now affords us the perfect opportunity to make amends for the last two performances.