Kildare character pleases Flanagan

Kildare manager Brian Flanagan clearly derived a lot more satisfaction from Sunday’s nervy win in Sligo than the comfortable home win over Fermanagh. This was a progress test, and he felt his team came out the right side of the examination. Something to build on.

“I want days like this where you’re pinned back and whether you’re a couple of points behind and you need to dig out and that way or whether it’s a day like today where it’s just really tight, really nervy and lads have to hold their nerve going down the home stretch, that’s the only way you develop,” Flanagan told us.

“Character and guts and everything; that’s required to see a game like today out. And they did that and there is huge value in a win like that and a performance like that. More so than when you win comfortably with ten or fifteen points to spare to be honest.” Kildare struggled to get going and never really looked wholly convincing. Why did he think that was?

“We were probably a little bit flat. I don’t think our energy levels were where we wanted them to be but that can happen away from home at times. The pitch as well was heavy to be perfectly honest, the ball wasn’t bouncing as well and it just felt for some reason, it played a bit tight, and it was hard to get that foot pass inside.” A battling defensive performance was key, he thought.

“I thought our defence was outstanding today. Sligo have real quality on an individual basis, like O’Connor, Murphy, Mc Loughlin at eleven, and they brought in Pat Spillane off the bench. They needed a result. They had genuine ambition of promotion when this league started.” “I thought our back six to a man stood up when maybe things weren’t happening for us up front and through the middle and off kick outs,” he continued.

“I thought they were excellent, Mick O’Grady, Brian Byrne and Ryan Burke until the yellow card I thought they were unbelievable today and really led the battle for us.” The midfield and forward play never reached the heights of that Fermanagh game but Sligo too found it hard to execute accurately up front.

“We were probably a little bit off with our execution with the wind at our back in the first half. I think we were eight from sixteen with the two-pointer in the middle of that whereas they were eight from twelve in the second half.” He felt “Sligo took over between 55 to 65 minutes but just missed their chances and kicked a couple of wides that probably let us off the hook if I’m being honest and when we did kick for home it came at the perfect time.” The bench is becoming increasingly important with the new rules putting additional fitness requirements on players and Flanagan believes it’s an area that needs looking at.

“It (the bench impact) is needed. That game up until 65 minutes there was nothing in it and it was only really in the minutes afterwards that we got the goal and pushed on that we began to feel somewhat comfortable. Kevin Flynn made a huge contribution, Ben comes in with a couple of minutes to go, sets up the goal.

“That’s going to be needed going forward. The new rules, the new game, the amount of high-speed running that’s involved in it. You’re going to need a minimum of five and obviously there’s a bit of debate now around an extra sub or two and I’d be in favour of that. I think it’s needed and five is just about cutting it for us at the minute.” 

With Leitrim coming up in a fortnight, Flanagan gave an update on the injury situation.

“We got good news on Harry (O’Neill), it was at the lower end of a hamstring strain so he should be back and ready to go in two weeks’ time. Ben (McCormack) obviously got minutes here today, Mark Dempsey and Eoin Lawlor should be back for two weeks’ time as well, they’re four weeks into their rehab so they’re very, very, close and we didn’t pick up anything new today.” Jimmy Hyland and Shane Farrell are a bit further from a return.

“Jimmy got the scan and will be out for another three to four weeks I’d imagine. Shane…difficult to put a timeline on it, it’s the plantar fascia at the bottom of the foot, he has got an injection booked in for a week’s time and it depends how he responds to that.”

Match report and analysis on page 78 and 79.