Maturity the key for Galway, says Bowles

RICHARD BOWLES, trainer of the Galway team which captured the TG4 All-Ireland Ladies Football senior title for the first time at the week-end, found it easy to empathise with the Dublin team which suffered defeat for the second year in a row.

As a former Limerick goalkeeper who kept a clean sheet in the 1991 Munster final against Kerry in Killarney he recalled yesterday how disappointed he had felt after his own county had failed to beat the Kingdom twice in this year's decider.

"You'd have to feel sorry for Dublin. They had two chances of goals in the first half and if even one of them had gone in we might not have been able to come back in the second half," he said. "But, you'd have to say this was a great step forward for Galway. Over the last two years they upped the intensity of their training and in the last year in particular, the maturity levels had come on. We nearly beat Mayo in the semi-final last year. Probably a bit of immaturity cost us victory on the day."

A member of the Limerick panel between 1989 and 2000 and the Galway minor trainer for a three-year period, he had no involvement with the Ladies game until manager P.J. Fahy invited him in as trainer following their success in the 2002 junior championship. He is assisted by Galway-man Mick O'Connell, holder of several county championships won with new champions Killerern. Bowles' home club is Oola and currently he is teaching Physical Education in Mary Immaculate training college in Limerick.

"I suppose you could say we lived dangerously at times on Sunday," he added. "We just could not seem to get into the pace of the game at the start, but we knew that with the experience of being in last year's final, Dublin would settle quicker. Our first goal before half-time was crucial, because it could have been a big problem for us if we had gone in 7-1 down at half-time.

"Once we started to get the scores on Sunday, the girls were absolutely fantastic."