New Longford manager Billy O’Loughlin in positive mood for possible promotion push

“We had a lot of possession, and it would have been closer had we taken more of our chances,” the Laois native commented.

“But we kept a clean sheet and we used 26 players against Dublin,” he added.

O’Loughlin was concerned about the high level of Longford turnovers. “We spoke about that after the Offaly game. However, it happened again in the match against Dublin, they got scores from us breaking down. But on the positive side, we held on to the ball and created two or three goal chances,” he stated.

Longford’s finishing generally was poor, including a number of shots into the hands of the Dublin keeper. 

“We missed a lot of scoring chances. We had oceans of possession but failed to score. You can’t afford to do that against teams of the quality of Dublin,” O’Loughlin commented.

The manager felt that Dublin were fresher on the day. “Joe Hagan played in four games in the space of seven days, as he had featured for DCU in the Sigerson Cup during the week. The bulk of our panel played in three games in the seven-day period,” he stated.

O’Loughlin was happy with the efforts of his young team. “We had a lot of lads playing who had never played inter-county and were thrown in at the deep end, such as Padraig Joyce, Eoghan McCormack, Darragh O’Connell and Daire O’Brien,” he stated.

He also praised the heroic effort of experienced defender Andrew Farrell. The Cashel clubman took the game to Dublin physically and worked relentlessly.

“You can’t buy Andrew’s strength. I think he shoved a couple of Dublin players over the line at one stage! He showed great heart,” he stated.

O’Loughlin has more of the experienced players to call on, with Barry O’Farrell and Robbie Smyth starting against Dublin. In addition, Daniel Mimnagh, Rian Brady and Kevin Diffley will come back into the mix.

“Kevin is back doing a bit of training and by the second or third round of the league will be an option,” he explained.

Looking ahead to the National League, O’Loughlin feels that this competition is Longford’s “championship.”

“We have seven championship games coming up. We are placing little or no emphasis on the Leinster Championship, which is a defunct competition,” he remarked.

“Hopefully there will be a competition soon where we can play against our peers, rather than lopsided competitions, where the likes of Longford have been cannon fodder for years,” he added.

With Longford having tried so many new players in January, this could add up to competition for places in some sectors of the team.

Ryan Moffett has been particularly impressive in defence and a number of new forwards have also been putting their hands up for selection in the league. 

“We will have to rejig things a bit ahead of the Limerick game. We will also have Mickey Quinn back as he was unavailable for the games against Offaly and Dublin in the O’Byrne Cup. We have lots of players to choose from,” O’Loughlin commented.