John Divilly on Carlow: The team Turlough O'Brien built is evolving nicely

The game has been stripped bare and the players are baring their souls

Mon, 19 Oct, 2020 - 06:45

No traffic. No crowds. No queues. No programmes. No tea. No Twix. No dodgy chips. No-one sitting beside you. No running commentary. No handbags. No latecomers. No chanter for the National Anthem. No colour. No Brendan Murphy. No pitch invasions. No Turlough with a clipboard. No half-time analysis at the urinals. No Poacher racing on the touchlines. No kids. No autographs. No craic. No Player Holding Back. No excuses.

The game has been stripped bare and the players are baring their souls.

I was fortunate to witness these young Carlow and Sligo men play football on Saturday evening.

They represented their families, clubs, and county with distinction. They honoured their jerseys.

They played with grit and tremendous spirit; like the stands were packed to the rafters. The Stand in Dr Cullen Park has witnessed many great days under the watchful eye of Turlough O’Brien. He enriched Carlow football. The players wanted to play and the supporters were eager to support. Suddenly he was gone and a huge void was created.

Carlow GAA chiefs had a huge task in pinpointing the right bainisteoir to build on the wonderful work of the past number of years.

They hit the jackpot with Niall Carew.

Carew knows Carlow football. He has an in-depth knowledge of their club game having sampled it firsthand with Palatine. He’s patrolled the sideline of Dr Cullen Park with barrages of love and hate exuding from the lips of the Barrowsiders.

He has recruited local knowledge with the addition of two excellent footballing coaches namely Simon Rea and Victor Doyle. And he’s recruited a quality head-coach, Ger Brennan.

Carlow football has changed and we got a few insights on Saturday evening that demonstrated these changes. The most obvious changes? Style and calmness.

Carlow went on the attack against Sligo. They looked up and played through the lines. Their inside line of Paul Broderick, Chris Blake, and Ross Dunphy all scored and amassed 1-8 from play between them. More importantly, though they were always looking for the ball. They stayed close to goal and moved menacingly around the D. Their inside runs were threatening and clever. They didn’t just move to get the ball, they moved to create space for each other and then doubled back to be an off-shoulder support runner if needed. They had energy. All they wanted was a consistent supply of ball and they certainly got that from their midfielders.

The Carlow centrefield pairing of Darragh Foley and Sean Gannon was their platform for success. Sligo opted to go ‘long’ with the majority of their kick-outs and the Carlow pairing competed tirelessly all evening which resulted in Carlow winning 16/21 of these restarts. With neither Brendan or Sean Murphy available for Carlow for the remainder of 2020 there was a huge onus on Gannon and Foley to deliver and they did.

Sean Gannon, their captain, set the tempo for his players to follow with his hard running and endless amount of covering. He had a chance to seal the game deep into injury time but his shot tailed wide due to exhaustion. He collected the next kickout under the nose of Niall Carew.

He once again carried the ball forward with pace and found himself in the same position but he slipped before he could contemplate a shot. He held his nerve and slipped a back-pass to Paul Broderick who calmly slotted over the lead point. Broderick and Gannon are the new leaders in the absence of the Murphys and their calmness under pressure was another notable change for Carlow.

The teams were level within a minute of returning from the final water-break. Sligo needed this victory more than Carlow.

A win would keep their promotion dreams alive. They threw everything they had at Carlow and took the lead but were rocked by a black card for sub Darragh Murphy. Sligo were attacking every Carlow kickout with ferocious intensity. They sensed victory and you could feel that Championship bite was gnawing at every player and itching to get out.

Carlow were awarded a free and a chance of an equaliser. Paul Broderick didn’t connect properly and the chance was lost. His reaction? Calmness. He moved out from his customary full forward line posting and collected a pass from his midfielder.

As the Sligo lads were converging to hunt him away from danger, he calmly lofted a 20-yard dink pass over the top of the onrushing Sligo defenders to the unmarked Carlow sub Conor Crowley and the Palentine / UCD student calmly dispatched his shot to the net. Carlow were ahead and they saw the game out with a calm reassured period of ball retention and cuteness. This Carlow calmness was expressed all evening with Carew and Brennan.

They didn’t interact negatively with their players or the officials. Possibly wearing a face-mask is an advantage and can muffle any ill-will feelings! They are only in the Carlow trenches a wet week and they are letting the players know that the team that Turlough built is evolving fast.

They have lots of conditioning work and defensive work to do with their squad before hopefully facing Offaly in a few weeks. The players will respond after this heart-warming performance.