Andy Moran says "the key is getting guys to believe"

On the face of it, hard to find positives in a 14 point defeat but Andy Moran saw enough in Leitrim’s second half performance against Galway in the FBD Insurance Connacht League last Friday to view the upcoming Allianz NFL Division 4 campaign in a positive frame of mind.

Last year’s provincial champions and All-Ireland finalists sauntered to a 3-21 to 1-13 victory over Leitrim in the NUI Galway Connacht GAA Air Dome but the Green & Gold manager, while acknowledging he was unhappy with the first half display, saw enough positive signs in the performance.

“I wouldn’t be happy with our first half,” Andy told the media after Friday’s game, “I thought we were very lax in our tackling, our pressing, our shooting, I thought it was lax but there has to be a positive and a negative all the time but today our second half was really, really good.

“I think we were three points up just on second half scores for a long time, we ended up losing the second half by a point but it was a really positive second half performance. But I wouldn’t have been happy with the first half.”

The small margins in inter-county football was reflected in Leitrim’s missed chances that might have made more of a game of it in the first half: “At one stage, they were 1-7 to 0-2 up and we missed 1-2, Jack had missed 1-1, he hit the post and missed the goal chance - we score them, all of a sudden, it is 1-4 to 1-7.

“Galway were very efficient in the first half, they didn’t miss. It wasn’t that we had 10 or 12 shots but when you’re playing against a team that is Division 1 and we’re division 4, you’ve got to take your chances and stop the goals going in the other side.”

What could make the difference for Leitrim is belief, a point Andy himself brought up when asked what changed in that second half: “It was just better - our tackling was better, our kicking was better.

“I think a key thing for me coming into Leitrim is making the guys believe they can compete at this level. When we play like that in the second half, they can see the glimmer of hope. But it is about the consistency in performing at that level all the time - I think these guys are way better than what they’ve showing, we showed well last year but there is a lot more in them and we need to keep pushing it on.

“The second half shows a little bit of belief in that if we go at it, we can go after this, we have a real chance but it is up to us to push it on. When you play a Division 1 team and play at that speed, it is really difficult to get up to that speed and it probably took us 30 minutes to get up to speed.

“When we started to kick the ball in the second half, tackle with greater intensity, put a bit of pressure on Galway. ”
Leitrim won’t come up against opposition of the calibre of Galway in their League campaign but Andy relished the opportunity to test his charges against Padraic Joyce’s team: “It is great for us, we had the opportunity to play another division 1 team this week and we needed to be careful because it is an upping of a level and when you play two in a week, you potentially get boys injured.”

Performance wise, the Leitrim manager was more than happy with the impact of the new boys on the team: “Michael McKiernan did very well, unlucky not to get a shot, some good turnovers, I thought Aidan Flynn was excellent, a new guy back again - he is new to me, not for ye but he is a brilliant addition.

“Paul Keaney at midfield played his first game for Leitrim since Waterford last year with injury and stuff that was going on so there was an awful lot of positives. Tom Quinn a huge positive, Adam Reynolds really handled himself well for his first game for Leitrim, not an easy task against Ian Burke.

“I thought Adam did really well and I think our newer guys in that first half were probably our better players which is good to see because you expect the senior guys to improve with the run into the National League.”

You definitely sensed that Moran was happy to increase the competition for places in the squad: “Great to see these young guys coming through, putting pressure on them. We’re looking for new guys to really impress - you see young Barry McNulty there, the hands on him, up in UCD playing Freshers for the next couple of weeks.

“So you’re looking for who can make the difference when the games are going down the stretch, who can be that difference that can win you a game or two. And the likes of Keith, Ryan, Mark Plunkett, Donal Casey, you’re looking to get them up to match pace so they can be as good as they always have been for us.

“We had seven or eight guys out tonight with illness, it just ran through our camp for a couple of weeks, we struggled with it but they’re all going to be fine.”

Leitrim’s interest in the FBD League is over but the Green & Gold will be frequent visitors to the Air Dome with a view to the Connacht Championship match against New York in mind, the surface in Gaelic Park also an astro-turf facility.

But it will be different when Leitrim take to Allianz League action on Sunday January 29, against Waterford in Avant Money Pairc Sean Mac Diarmada: “This surface here is great because when we go to New York at the end of the League, this is what we’re playing on so we’ll be here a few times over the next couple of weeks.

“The surface in Pairc Sean at the end of January is going to be soft, it is going to be heavy, we can’t do anything about that but that’s life but we just need to go and compete and do well in the game.”