Mangan says youth can revive Westmeath fortunes

Former Westmeath corner-forward Alan Mangan says it’s vital the Leinster championship does not revert to being battle between just two or three counties.

Mangan, a key attacker in the historic first ever Leinster final win by Westmeath in 2004, is afraid that emigration, in particular, could impact on counties keeping pace with the likes of Dublin and Kildare. This evening either his native Westmeath or Louth, two of the sides to emerge over the past decade to break the dominance of Dublin, Meath and Kildare, will bow out of the championship before the start of July and not have a competitive game again until next January.

“It is very hard to make progress given how long there will be without a game. They need to change the system regarding the training ban and that impacts badly on a team knocked out of the championship early.

“Teams that advance in the championship, especially those that get to the final, are still buzzing come the end of the year. But those that go out early are starting from standstill when January comes round.

“They should adopt some sort of system that allows a team to resume and continue training three or four months after they have been knocked out of the championship,” said Mangan, who manages the Westmeath ladies football team who play Meath in the Leinster semi-final tomorrow along with another of the 2004 heroes Martin Flanagan. Mangan says that while Westmeath’s fortunes have dipped, he is confident that they can rebuild through youth and points to letting Dublin off the hook a couple of times in recent years at U21 level when they went on to win the All-Ireland. “It showed they were not far off the Dubs and there is a good, young squad there at the moment. But keeping them together is the difficulty. And I know it is the same for Louth, who have lost a lot to emigration. The likes of Dublin and Kildare don’t seem to be affected as much but there is a danger for some of the other counties that they will fall. You have to bear in mind it is not just established players who have gone.

“How many have promising club players have been lost to emigration before they got a chance to breakthrough at county level in the past few years? It’s a big factor but it is vital that we have several counties competing to win Leinster every year and not go back to the situation where there was only a couple of teams in contention every year,” added Mangan, who believes Westmeath will exact revenge on Louth in this evening’s qualifier for their earlier Leinster championship loss.