Longford manager Paddy Christie very frustrated with poor first half display against Carlow

Speaking following his side’s two-point defeat to Carlow in the Tailteann Cup on Sunday, Longford manager Paddy Christie expressed his disappointment with the loss and especially, the first half display of his charges. 

The former Dubs star admitted, “It is very disappointing to have come away with a defeat from the game. It is one that we were not expecting to win by an awful lot, but I felt we were in a position before the game that we would be capable of winning that game by two or three points, so to lose by two points is very frustrating.”

He suggested that Longford lost the game in the opening 35 minutes. “I think we lost the game in the first half. We played with the breeze, and we did not take full advantage of the conditions and played poorly. The second half was much better, different things happened, both good and bad, but there was more buzz and energy to us, but to be playing with quite a strong breeze in the first half and going in at the break two points behind having underperformed is disappointing.”

Longford looked to be in the ascendency when Patrick Fox’s goal put them three points up, but just when it looked like Longford would drive on to win the contest, they were reduced to fourteen players for a ten minute spell when Mickey Quinn received a black card, and the Longford manager agreed that the momentum swung back to Carlow after that, but he also thought that it was a necessary foul.

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“Yes, Carlow did take over after the black card, but it was just one of those things that happens in a match, and if the foul wasn’t made, there was a strong possibility that they could have got in for a goal. Although it was further out the pitch, he went in with a heavy physical challenge, and to be honest, I didn’t mind that because strong challenges from our players were seriously lacking in the first half, so I can put up with that challenge from Mickey.” 

Paddy again lamented that first half display. “To me, the damage was done in the first half. When you are playing with that type of wind, and you are going into the contest with high confidence after having played well against Wicklow, to go out and play poorly in the first half, scoring two points less than them is not acceptable. Carlow’s scores seemed to come very easy as well, and we did not make them work hard enough for their scores. 

“It was also very frustrating to see our players playing the ball laterally across our own defence while playing with the breeze, so quite a few aspects of our game fell short of what is expected. In the second half, we tried very hard and there was a bit of bite to us, and we played some good football as well.”

Looking ahead to next weekends’ preliminary quarter-final, Longford face a very tricky away trip to Newry to face Down, and it was put to Paddy Christie that it will be a difficult task to lift the players ahead of that knockout contest.

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He remarked, “We will be highly motivated for that must win match, as we feel that we have a score to settle with Down, as it was our defeat to them in Newry that relegated us from Division three of the Allianz National League. 

“I don’t care that we will be playing away. We just need to play well for the entire duration of the match and not just for one half. Our attitude will have to be right from start to finish. 

“It is a matter of saying to the players that we have a score to settle with Down, but to be honest, we have a bigger score to settle with ourselves more than anything else. We must sort ourselves out and we know that we are capable of producing higher quality football than what we produced against Carlow.”