McNulty: U20 victory over Mayo massive for future of Leitrim football

There’s a saying about an old head on young shoulders and if ever a player embodied that notion, Barry McNulty certainly does as he spoke of what exactly last Wednesday’s 3-12 to 0-16 victory over Mayo in the Eirgrid Connacht U20 Championship would mean for the future of Leitrim football.

Still breathless after the historic victory, be it from excitement or the immense performance he delivered, Barry stressed just what the win means for Leitrim: “It is huge. For us as a Leitrim team, to be coming up and finally beat one of the big dogs, that’s massive for years going forward, putting belief into a Leitrim team. 

“When you get to 23, 24, it is hard to go out in a championship game, it is hard to go out and believe you are going to beat them when you have never done it before. Well, I think that is massive for Leitrim football because that group of lads there, they have a massive win under their belts and when they get to adult football, that we believe we can take down teams like that, it is unbelievable.”

For some, the victory comes with a cost as both Barry and Jack Foley are ruled out of Sunday’s Connacht SFC clash with Sligo but the young Glencar Manorhamilton man doesn’t see it like that: “That makes it worth it. The opportunity to come out and perform four days later after a disappointing one on Saturday.

“Once we got promoted, that was the agreement, we knew we were coming back here. You have to hand it to them boys, how could you leave them hanging, unbelievable. We knew what we were coming here to do and thank God we got it done.”

REPORT: LEITRIM END 26 YEAR WAIT AS U20S SHOCK MAYO IN BALLINAMORE

Naturally there is disappointment over missing the Senior game but Barry felt that after losing the League Final, playing last Wednesday was a perfect antidote: “That’s football, there are highs and lows and the way the football season has gone now, you have six or seven days to turn around.

“It was a wee bit shorter but there was a day you were down in the dumps there on Sunday but you have to pick yourself up. But the lads there, how could you not want to come up there and give it for them? They were on to us from Saturday on after the game, asking for us to get ready for this game. We knew that Jack and I were coming here on Wednesday with a job to do so we were focusing on it as soon as Saturday was over.”

It was also a performance that Barry felt was coming, with signs of it against Galway despite their loss in Ballinasloe: “That group of lads put in a serious shift from the start of the year. You’re right, victories against Mayo don’t come too often but I think the group really did believe we could go and win that.

“It is not like other years where maybe people would say ah yeah, you might have a chance but that group in there, we knew a big performance was coming. There were sparks of it in Galway, we played in patches and we showed it today, I thought we played a good solid 60 minutes performance.”

IN PICTURES: LEITRIM FANS CELEBRATE FAMOUS VICTORY OVER MAYO IN CONNACHT U20 FC

The Senior star also highlighted the performance of the full-back line on the night: “There were one or two hairy moments when balls were going across the box but no, it didn’t really look like we were going to concede goals. Arek, Tom, Eanna - that full-back line, they were absolutely unbelievable.

“It looked cagey at times but we had that cushion. We had our gameplan, we got a few goals and looked at maybe where Mayo were weaker and credit to the lads, we dropped bodies back.”