Joint St Eunan’s manager Pauric Ryan was very proud of the character his young side showed to comeback and defeat Naomh Conaill in the Division 4 final on Saturday.
Ryan, who manages the team alongside Declan O’Donnell, insisted that it was super to get over the line against Naomh Conaill, mentioning that a couple of suggestions by them at interval helped them over the line.
“It’s super, it’s always nice to win. We were in a bit of bother at half-time but we made a couple of not so much tactical changes but suggestions at the break and it seemed to do the trick.”
The Letterkenny men were struggling at certain stages of this encounter, being five adrift at one point in the opening stanza and two behind at the break.
When asked what exactly was said to the players during the team-talk, Pauric Ryan discussed how getting the ball into the forwards quicker in the second half was important, especially with the talent and pace which they possess.
“We were struggling big time”, said Ryan. “ We missed a few chances so we were comfortable with how we were going. You don’t like singling out players but Conor Gibbons is a fabulous footballer and our entire forward line has loads of pace so we just had to get the ball into the boys quicker and we did that and it worked.”
The black and amber men showed real character to rally back against a talented Naomh Conaill outfit. It was a performance that brought pride to Pauric Ryan and Declan O’Donnell. This was largely down to the youthfulness of the team, with progressing the youngsters into senior football being one of the main aims of the Division 4 team.
“Absolutely, very proud. We brought on three minors and that was our aim with this team in the first place, to get as many young lads progressing into adult football as possible. The bulk of those players would be under-21 apart from the few obvious ones.”
The joint St Eunan’s boss concluded by stating his delight at sealing victory and lifting the Division 4 league title on Saturday, with this being one of the two competitions the squad compete in.
“Silverware is silverware. There are only two competitions to play in for this group of players and we’ve got one of them so it is just brilliant.”
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