Sports
Galway depleted for opening round of National League against Meath
GALWAY’S bid to make a winning start to their Division 2 National League campaign against Meath at Pearse Stadium on Sunday (2pm) hasn’t been helped by a range of absentees due to injuries and Corofin’s All-Ireland club commitments.
The news didn’t get any better over the past few days with Annaghdown’s Damien Comer ruled out of contention for the next few weeks after breaking a finger in the intermediate hurling semi-final against Bennettsbridge on Sunday while Micheál Breathnach’s Peadar Ó Griofa picked up an injury with NUI Galway.
They join Paul Conroy and Johnny Duane on the injured list while Finian Hanley, on a belated January honeymoon, has just resumed training last week. The long term news on Conroy and Duane is quite positive with both expected to be back pushing for first team places for the March 1 home clash with Laois.
Back into contention for starting places on Sunday are the Cortoon trio of Adrian and Paul Varley and Cathal Mulryan, who were ruled out of FBD action due to their involvement with the third level colleges.
While the long term prognosis for Galway is encouraging, with the injection of possibly up to eight Corofin players into the panel and the return of his injured men, Kevin Walsh must face up to the far more immediate challenge in the shape of a Meath side that ran Dublin to two points in the O’Byrne Cup semi-final (1-15 to 1-13).
“For the moment we just have to look at what’s facing us on Sunday. In terms of player availability, we have what we have, and this will be an opportunity for a number of players to stake a place on the team.
“We could have done without the latest injury news on Damien Comer and Peadar Ó Griofa but we just have pick ourselves up and really make a huge effort to secure two home points on Sunday,” said Walsh.
He said that while they couldn’t ignore the lessons from Roscommon’s goal burst last Sunday, the overall performance from Galway was quite good, and they fought all the way to the end.
“We’ve had a good hard look at where things went wrong for us last Sunday, for a very short but a very crucial period of the second half, and we’ve been working hard to tighten things up for next Sunday.
“A good start in the league can make a really big difference and I know that the team we’ll line out on Sunday will give this match a big go. Early points in the league can help to build momentum but we are facing a major challenge,” added Walsh.
His Meath counterpart Tommy Dowd has made no secret of the fact that one of his big ambitions for 2015 is to win promotion to Division One of the National League and he will be travelling to Salthill with quite a settled side.
Paddy O’Rourke, sub Michael Newman and Sean Tobin, by all accounts, posed the most serious threat to Dublin in an O’Byrne Cup semi-final that drew a crowd of 7,500 people to Pairc Tailteann in Navan.
Meath are always an ultra-competitive outfit and in the corresponding fixture last year in Navan they dished out a 3-18 to 4-11 beating to Galway, a match that was to be a portent of things to come in terms of defensive frailties later in the year.
That scoreline does tend to take on an added relevance given Roscommon’s second half scoring burst in the FBD league final at Kiltoom on Sunday when they cut apart the Galway defence to rifle home four second half goals.
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.
Galway United 6
Finn Harps 0
GALWAY United marked their 800th competitive game at Eamonn Deacy Park in style on Monday evening when they smashed six goals without reply past hapless, hopeless Harps, to remain 10 points clear at the top of the table at the half-way point in the season.
A stunning couple of hours, both in terms of the weather and the football played by the home side, started on a more sombre note when three people with strong links to United were remembered in a minute’s silence that was impeccably observed.
Paul Cahill from Shantalla (and formerly of Cahill’s Shop on Cooke’s Corner) was a lifelong United who died suddenly while on holiday in Thailand, and he was remembered before the game; as was Salthill native Pat Diskin, a freelance journalist who covered United across three decades from the 1980s to the 2000s.
The thoughts of everyone in the ground were also with Bernie Ward, who buried her sister, Bridget Sweeney, on the morning of the game. Bernie’s husband, Mike, owns the catering trucks that serve at food at every United home game, and Bernie works tirelessly at every United home game, feeding the fans.
United paid tribute to that trio with a stunning opening to the game, which saw the three points wrapped up before we had even reached 20 minutes at the clock, by which time visiting goalkeeper, Tim Hiemer, had picked the ball out of the net four times.
There were four changes to the side which had been held to a 1-1 draw by Bray Wanderers at the Carlisle Grounds on Friday night. Rob Slevin was sent off in that game on two yellow cards and so served an automatic one-match ban on Monday.
Conor O’Keeffe picked up a nasty gash on his face thanks to a stray Bray Wanderers elbow and missed out on Monday; while Francely Lomboto and Vince Borden dropped to the bench, the first game all season that Borden has not started.
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.
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The Salthill Fives came back in style at the weekend when crowds thronged Salthill Park for two days of non-stop football and entertainment.
Salthill Park was transformed with three 5-a-side pitches, a food village, music in the bandstand, pilates, yoga, circuits, kids coaching sessions, football KitBox with their unusual shirts, and the barbershop where hair and beards were trimmed all weekend; while Croí was on site as designated charity partners offering free blood pressure checks.
The centre-piece, however, was the actual football, which saw three tournaments held over the weekend: competitions for U-13 boys and U-13 girls, and the main event, the men’s tournament, with Deputy Mayor, Cllr Mike Cubbard, on hand to present the medal’s after the various finals.
Marvoy’s Classic Seven emerged as victors with former Galway United star, Padraic Cunningham, scoring the winning goals as they came from a goal down to beat Corrib Rangers. To cap a perfect weekend for the Headford native, he was also awarded the Diarmuid Fadden Player of the Tournament Award.
The ‘Ray Healy’ award for fair play was awarded by the referees to Eoin Roche of Smack your Pitch Up, who was presented with his award by Ray’s mother Christine; while a new award this year, The Spirit of the Fives in memory of Pat ‘Chippy’ Colman, was presented to Jimmy Jennings of Corrib Rangers.
Speaking on the pitch after the final, Salthill Devon Chairman Pete Kelly, thanked everybody who made the event possible.
“Where would we be without sponsors? Ground & Co came on board as main sponsors; Seven Bar, Seapoint Leisure and Blackrock Cottage were pitch sponsors with the boys and girls being sponsored by Dough bros and Curry’s Funfair.
“In addition, the support of the Village Salthill and the Salthill Devon committee made the ‘Return of the Fives’ a resounding success. The support of the Galway City Council was, as ever, an invaluable element in the entire operation – these partnerships can deliver quality events for the city, and planning has already started for 2024,” he said.
A week after hitting the half-way point in the First Division campaign, the league is set to enter its annual two-week midseason break after this Friday’s round of fixtures, and taking all three points on offer from their trip to Ferrycarrig Park to take on Wexford FC (7.45pm) will see United’s players heading for the country’s airports with a spring in their step.
The players are understood to be getting a week away from the weekly routine of collective training – though they will be expected to do their own little bits and pieces while they down tools – and they won’t want to sour the holiday mood by dropping points against a side they have beaten twice already this season.
It took them a while to make their dominance count on the scoreboard in the first meeting between the sides back in April, but once David Hurley opened the scoring in first-half injury-time in Ferrycarrig Park, there was only going to be one winner, and second-half goals from Francely Lomboto, Darren Clarke, and Vince Borden sealed a 4-0 win.
They were far more comfortable than the final 2-0 scoreline suggests in the second meeting between the sides in May, when the visitors to Eamonn Deacy Park parked the bus in trying to keep the score down, which they at least managed to achieve.
They will welcome United to their home patch on a bit of decent form, having taken seven points from their last three games, and they possess a real thereat in Aaron Dobbs, a man who would look great in a United jersey not only in the second-half of this season, but in the top-flight next year as well.
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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