BY MATTHEW WILSON
THE Donegal minor hurlers face a trip to Armagh for this Saturday’s Ulster Shield Final and manager Lorcan O’Toole is hoping that his side can put their best foot forward.
O’Toole was appointed the manager of the minor squad this year, taking over from Daithi Roberts who oversaw the group last term.
He assembled his panel and gathered the players for the start of their training on the fifth of January, expressing that there are constant improvements being made by the group.
“We’re making steady enough progress, you can see an improvement in different aspects of our play. Getting up to game pace has been the hardest thing really.
“Training has been a struggle over the last few weeks, Convoy has been shut for a lot of teams so we’ve been training a lot on astro and small pitches, we haven’t gotten on grass much and that’s constrained us a bit but everything is going in the right direction.”
Donegal have been involved in two competitive contests to date this season. They defeated Tyrone on the opening day in Garvaghey before losing out to Armagh on home soil while their third scheduled encounter was a walkover against Down.
Speaking to the Donegal News, O’Toole stated that he’s pleased with how the group are reacting to the demands that are being asked of them since they assembled.
“We were happy with the win away to Tyrone. We lost to Armagh at home and we were definitely disappointed with that. Armagh’s passing was a lot more fluid and I think they’re just a bit ahead of us with regards to the fundamentals.
“We had a challenge game at the weekend up in Derry and that went very well, we saw a lot of improvements there. In fairness to the boys, they’re responding to what we’re asking them to do and they’re responding in training.
“Anything we’re focused on in training, we can see that it’s starting to improve. Once you see improvement then you’re happy.”
Donegal GAA announced the appointment of Sean McVeigh as the Hurling Performance/Talent Development Lead last week.
In late 2025, the GAA’s National Head of Hurling, Willie Maher, met with clubs from the county in Convoy, including the seven new units established last year.
At the meeting, hurling officer Cormac Hartnett set out the plans being put in place by Donegal GAA to drive urgent hurling development.
This had led to McVeigh’s appointment and with his knowledge of the game and a masters in high performance sport, O’Toole feels that it’s a huge step forward for hurling in the county.
“It’s a massive step, it brings us really close to party with the football. In fairness to Sean, he was at our game on Sunday and he’s coming to training so he’s really keen to get it up and running.
“Sean is a hurling man himself and also has masters so he has great knowledge. It’ll be interesting to see what he brings to it. He’s another voice in the room, he’s another man there beating the drum for hurling in the county and bringing that professional level organisation of things as well.
“It’s a step in the right direction and I have to give kudos to the likes of Cormac Hartnett and Mary Coughlan. It’s an innovative approach and it’s great to see it for the small hurling community that’s in the county that we are being backed as much as possible.”
Up next for O’Toole’s outfit is an Ulster Minor Hurling Shield Final against Armagh this Saturday, with the clash taking place in the Orchard County.
Armagh defeated Donegal by nine points in the group stage of the competition a number of weeks ago.
However, the Donegal boss feels that his side have learned from their mistakes on that occasion and expressed that they don’t fear this Saturday’s opponents.
“We’ve Armagh away and Middletown is never an easy place to go. From our own point of view, we feel we’ve improved since that Armagh game, we learned a lot from it and we did video analysis after it.
“It’s focused our training in the last few weeks. We’ll go down to Armagh and give it a crack anyway, we don’t fear them.
“I wouldn’t say we’re quietly confident either but we’ll go there, give it a good crack, put our best foot forward and see what we get out of it.”
With a piece of silverware on the line, the stakes are always higher and that will certainly be the case when the two teams take to the field in Middletown this Saturday.
The Donegal minor hurlers have shown great effort and commitment since they gathered for pre-season training at the turn of the year and Four Masters clubman hopes that they reap the rewards for that this weekend.
“It would be a great boost for the lads and a reward for all their hard work as they’re a dedicated bunch. We’ve been training since the fifth of January, we’re training two or three times a week so they put in a big effort.
“They respond to everything that we’re asking of them so a good performance would be a good reward for their efforts so far and a bit of silverware would be a bonus then.”
