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Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Green and Red-emption
BY ANTHONY HENNIGAN
IT’S ONE of the oldest, most trusted methods of any manager; the good old half-time rollicking.
The results can be varied, but Paul Jordan’s urgings had the desired effect when encouraging Mayo to an emphatic victory over Westmeath in Saturday’s All-Ireland Ladies MFC shield final, at Ballinamore.
The Green and Red were perhaps fortunate to hold a one-point lead at the interval but despite their opponents levelling within seconds of the restart, Mayo held Westmeath scoreless for the remainder, and ran out 14 points winners. Their second half display drew immense praise from Jordan’s co-manager Gerry Carmody.
“It was a mighty second 30 minutes by the girls. We knew they could do it. Paul made a fantastic speech at halftime, he gave them a hard time and I think it really rose some of them. Our half-forward line hadn’t been in the game that much, they weren’t getting the ball into Sinead Cafferky, but they upped their game big time in the second half,” said Carmody, who had watched his team slip 1-2 to no score in arrears within seven minutes of throw-in.
“We were in trouble there for a while when that first goal went in, I was panicking a small bit but we kept the faith. The players were nervous in the first half but they came out after half-time and fair play to them, they came out fighting. We knew then that we had a great chance because Aileen Gilroy had come on, she’s probably one of the best footballers in the country, but it just shows you the faith we had in the 15 that started.”
Gilroy, recently returned from international soccer commitments, is among eight or nine minors also involved with the Mayo senior panel busily preparing for next Monday’s championship opener against Kerry. Kerry native Carmody believes Saturday’s victory serves as a timely boost.
“Mayo ladies football was in the doldrums there for a while but this might spark it on. It’s great to have a win like this going into the Kerry game because you can see the confidence that winning generates among the players.”
Many of the Mayo players were on the side beaten by Cork in last year’s replayed minor shield final, and they used that painful experience as motivation second time around, among them the captain, Carol Hegarty.
“We can’t believe it. It’s been a brilliant day. We’ve been working towards this since the beginning of the year. We all knew what it was like to lose last year and it really got to us. We realised what we had to do, we had the experience, and we came back this year knowing we really wanted to win and that’s exactly what we did. It just makes victory all the more sweeter,” said the St Brigid’s club-player, who remains a minor next year.
“We realised that we had the work to do in the second half and we did it in the end. We only gave away one score. Our backs were amazing,” she added, reserving special words for the management team of Jordan, Carmody, Siobhan Lawlor and Eileen Jordan.
“We couldn’t have done it without them. They believed in us before we did and I hope we’ve done them proud. I think we did.”
A county thinks the same.
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