Veteran Joyce stars as Tribesmen have too much for Derry

You know that old chestnut about the attendance of your funeral being largely dependent on the weather?

Well, the same logic evidently applies to followers of Derry football as the attendance barely scraped over 1,500 at Celtic Park yesterday.

Those that opted instead for the TV remote and the Six Nations rugby missed little from the home team here. With a raw full-back line and a half-back line that offered them little in the way of protection, Galway were given enough chances to cling to their coattails in the opening quarter. Then they went about punching several holes in the defence to score 1-5 to Derry’s solitary point in the second quarter. After baptising several of the bright young things in Galway to the ways of the National League, Alan Mulholland watched his team grow in confidence throughout, aided in no small way by a magnificent second half by veteran Nicky Joyce, a late inclusion in the starting line-up.