Derry manager Ciarán Meenagh was thrilled by the response of his players as they overcame adversity to record their second consecutive Division 2 game against Kildare at a rainy and sleety Cedral St Conleths Park on Saturday.
The odds were stacked against the Oak Leafers when they lost captain and talisman Conor Glass to a red card after just six minutes after an off-the-ball incident with Callum Bolton. They also had a near nine-minute spell down to 12 men when Niall Loughlin and Conor Doherty in the sin bin after black cards.
All that meant that Derry, who had moved into a five-point lead when Shane McGuigan scored a 16th-minute goal but didn’t score in the first half after, couldn’t make the most of the wind behind them in the first half.
Kildare, who also had Alex Beirne sent off in the 25th minute, went in at half time 1-10 to 1-6 ahead after a lucky 33rd-minute Brian McLoughlin goal. It was looking bleak for Derry when Ben Loakman, who finished the game with 10 points, put Kildare five clear early in the second half, but the game swung on a magnificent individual goal by Paul Cassidy in the 38th minute. A second goal by Lachlan Murray followed less than a minute later and from there Derry never relinquished the lead.
“It was a perilous position at half time,” agreed Meenagh. “We just showed unbelievable character there, that was helped by the start we made to the second half. Once we got those two goals, the game probably took on a life of its own then. I’ve been in games like that before where we’ve had the wind in the second and when it goes like that tactics go out the window.
“In fairness, it was difficult for them. They had the breeze in the second half but the ground was cutting up, it’s a lovely stadium here but the pitch conditions were very, very challenging to say the least,” the Derry manager.
Meenagh felt that his players lost their way a little during the first half after losing Glass and then the two black cards but once they were able to regroup at half time they were able to deliver a much better performance and build on the three point win over Tyrone in the previous round.
“I felt we played well against Tyrone but didn’t win the game by as much as we could have. Tonight was the opposite of that, we didn’t well at all. The game became very, very fractious from very early on. We started off going into that three point lead but we turned over ball and then Conor got sent off and then we got a black card and it became very easy for them to keep the ball against the breeze and pick us off, their inside forward line was devastating in the first half. We had a bit of surgery to do there at half time in terms of how we were going to set up and I thought the lads stood up, some of them that didn’t play very well in the first half came good in the second,” said Meenagh.
S McGuigan 1-5 (1tp, 1f), L Murray 1-3, P Cassidy 1-0, N Loughlin 0-3, C Doherty 0-3 (1tp), M Downey 0-1.
B Loakman 0-10 (2tp, 2fs), B McLoughlin 1-2, C Bolton 0-2, E Cully 0-2, C Moran 0-1, N Flynn 0-1.
: S McGuckin; D Baker, R Forbes, S Young; C Doherty, G McKinless, P McGrogan; C Glass, B Rogers; E Doherty, S Downey, P Cassidy; N Loughlin, S McGuigan, L Murray. Subs: M Downey for Young , h/t; N Toner for S Downey, 54; C McAteer for Loughlin, 66.
: C Burke; H O’Neill, P Spillane, R Burke; J Harris, E Lawlor, B Byrne; K Feely, B Gibbons; B McLoughlin, C Bolton, C Moran; B Loakman, A Beirne, E Cully 0-2. Subs: D Kirwan for Moran, 43; J McKevitt for Harris, 48; S Doran for Feely, 59; N Flynn for McLoughlin, 58; J McGrath for O’Neill, 65.
: D Gough (Meath).
