Leitrim manager Mike Wall pleased with display against quality Sligo side

The day may have ended in an eight point defeat but manager Mike Wall was a pleased man thanks to the battling display his Leitrim team put in against Sligo in Saturday’s Allianz NHL Division 4 clash in Heartland Credit Union Pairc Sean Mac Diarmada.

“The way you have to look at that, Sligo are a grade above us, two years ago, they were in the Christy Ring,” said Mike, “I'm very, very proud of the lads. They really, really, really fought. They have a lot of pride in the jersey. They're trying to do the right thing. Our style of play today was very good. 

“We had a game plan to do our best to keep with Sligo. They beat Monaghan 2-20 to 0-8 last week and we pushed them a bit harder there today and I was very happy with that performance.”

When put to him that the eight point margin didn’t reflect the closeness of the game nor the fact that the Yeatsmen got away with a foul for one of their goals, Mike reacted positively: “You’re dead right and I’m glad you are after saying that because we’re just after saying that to the lads - look, they got two goals against the run of play. 

“Goals are goals but it is not like they ran through us or they created them - a handling error on one and I think Conor Hackett was probably fouled but they are the marginal calls. If we had got it, we’d have taken it so you can’t blame the referee for that. I’m very, very happy with that performance.”

The concession of frees hurt Leitrim and Mike agrees it is something to look at: “We go in at half time and we see we scored eight points, seven from play. Sligo scored ten but four from play. We had a couple of silly frees that we gave away - we were going into the back of players instead of just standing off and tackling them when they got up. Giving away the silly frees.

“I thought Sligo's handling were a little bit sharper than ours today but again, they have a lot of Easkey guys there who went all the way to a junior final who didn't stop hurling at all. We all know in Leitrim with the lack of clubs, the lack of hurling a lot of these lads have done. So I think we've done remarkably well against a team that shouldn't be in Division 4.”

Despite two defeats, Mike is optimistic for the rest of the campaign: “The heads are certainly not down because we know we're building. Our goal was to do as well as we could in the league because we don't play Sligo in the Lory Meagher so our goal was to come in and to learn about the team and set up.

“The way we set up today was a different way than we set up last week. The lads adapted really, really well. We're going over to Warwickshire now and we have to target four wins for the rest of the league. We had a better performance this week than we had last week. Whatever happens in the league, we're not going to worry about it for the Championship.

“We started off last year with a win against Lancashire and a win against Longford. They were so narrow and we probably thought we were a little bit further ahead than where we were. I think right now, even though two losses, they're against two very good teams and as long as the performances are there this time of the year, we'll be OK.”