'We have to get over this now' - Roscommon manager

By Kevin Egan

Roscommon manager Davy Burke felt his side lacked the energy and aggression they had shown against Mayo in their defeat to Galway last Sunday.

“Energy levels were through the floor,” was his explanation of the team’s comparatively lethargic first-half effort as Galway gradually turned the screw after the first quarter.

“They’re the best defensive team in the country, that’s in black and white. You can’t give them a four-point head start at half-time.

“Emotionally, two weeks ago we were very up for it and it’s very hard to get to the pitch of it again as quickly. Ultimately, I think in the second half we flushed out our legs, whatever was holding us back. I though we expressed ourselves and we showed our better side," said Burke.

“We needed a bit more aggression, we needed to press them higher up the field. I thought John Maher was getting the better of Enda Smith at midfield, but John didn’t want to play in the half-back line and I thought Enda turned the game for 15 minutes when we pushed him out of midfield into centre-forward,” Burke said, while he also cited their inability to add to Ciaráin Murtagh’s goal with another green flag, or two.

“We just didn’t take our goal chances, Conor Daly’s goal chance was probably more difficult to miss than to get. Then the ball comes back [off the post] for Damien (Comer) to tap into the net and those are the margins.

“Ben O’Carroll intercepted a short kickout and gave it to Conor Cox, he slipped. Ah Jaysus, Cian Connolly went in one-on-one, we had four or five good goal chances against the best defence in Ireland, and we only took one of them – it’s not going to work, is it?”

It was suggested that like Mayo a fortnight previously, Roscommon’s prospects in the All-Ireland race haven’t been harmed too much by this defeat.

Three teams will qualify for knockout football out of each group of four, and on current form, it would take a devilishly tough draw, and a dreadful dip in form, for Roscommon to finish bottom of four teams in any group.

Burke was unequivocal, however – he wanted to come into the round robin stages on the back of playing Sligo for the Nestor Cup.

“Make no bones about it, we wanted to be in the Connacht final, we wanted to be seed one or seed two, it’s a simple as that,” he said.

“We have to get over this now. We need a break as well, and we have an opportunity to have a break, so we’ll take a week off and then come back for three weeks to prepare for the round robin.

“When it comes to it, you probably want to be at home first to get a couple of points on the board, but who knows who’s going to be in what draw and what seed?

At this stage, it’s the first year of it, who knows, but we wanted to be a one or two seed, we wanted a Connacht final against Sligo, and we didn’t get there,” he said.

“Ultimately, we’re in decent shape, I think we’re a good side. On any given day I think we can compete with any of them. The ball didn’t break for us today, it broke for them, and there’s the result,” the Roscommon manager concluded.