This week, Dessie discusses the pros and cons of an All-Ireland League, the form of Ronan Finn and why Dundalk should be hopeful of a change in fortunes.
Watching the Setanta Cup Final on Saturday night, the main thing that stood out for me was the performance of Ronan Finn in midfield for Rovers. From the start, it looked like whoever got the opening goal was going to win the match, it was Rovers that got it and went on to win and not for the first time this season, Finn was the man of the match.
I’ve seen him three or four times over the last few weeks and he’s impressed me more and more with every game. He gives Rovers a different dimension to what they had last season. I don’t mean to be disrespectful to any of the lads that played last year, but we didn’t have anybody that can do the things he does with the ball.
I always thought an All-Ireland League would be a great idea.
This season, you can see that Michael O’Neill wants the lads playing the ball from the back, which we didn’t really do last season. He wants the lads getting it to Finn as soon and as often as possible and the other central midfielder – whether it’s Stephen Rice or Chris Turner, are there more or less to do all the spade work for him.
From what I hear from the Rovers lads, he’s getting better and better at training and they will have a job to hold on to him at the end of the season if he keeps putting in those sort of performances.
Little enthusiasm for the Setanta Cup
It was another medal for the Rovers lads, but to be honest, I’m not a fan of the Setanta Cup. When it first started there was a lot of hype around it and it was nice to see how the teams in our league would fare out against the teams from the north because there was always the issue of bragging rights and which league was better.
There were good attendances at the start as well, but it’s died off in the last couple of years and has become more of a hindrance to managers than anything else because of all the games they have to catch up on and having to get the lads in for extra training during the week.
Ronan Finn has oozed class for Shamrock Rovers this season
I know Michael will be delighted to win it and it gives him the opportunity to give his fringe players a run out and keep their fitness up, but overall, I don’t think the tournament has caught the imagination. I certainly got that vibe when I was talking to the Rovers players at training a few weeks back; they more or less were looking at it as something they had to get out of the way. It’s over and done with now and they’ve another medal in their back pockets so they should be happy enough.
All-Ireland League?
When you’re playing teams from the north as you do in the Setanta Cup, the prospect of an All-Ireland League comes to mind and I always thought it would be a great idea. I thought that if all the games started off at 3 o’clock on Saturday like in England, that there would be more people at the games and that it would get better coverage in the media.
From what I’ve seen and from what I’ve heard from friends that play up there, however, the standard isn’t great and I don’t think the top teams would be able to compete with the likes of Shamrock Rovers, Sligo Rovers and Derry City at the moment.
Maybe the prospect of playing in an All-Ireland League would encourage the teams in Northern Ireland to improve their squads, to put more money into the game up there and give the domestic leagues in this country the boost they need. That’s for another day, though, but with Sligo winning and jumping four places in the table at the weekend, the Airtricity League as it is has become a bit more exciting after it had looked for a while that Shamrock Rovers might run away with it.
Positive signs for Dundalk
Dundalk are currently seventh in the league, but there were signs from their performance the last day that they have the potential to be a lot better than that. I’ve said in the past that I thought Dundalk could do well and you have to remember that it takes a lot of time for a team to adapt when you bring in the amount of players that Dundalk have.
You could see it in patches against Rovers the sort of quality football that Dundalk are capable of. The likes of Jason Byrne, Mark Quigley, Stephen McDonnell and the two wingers – Ross Gaynor and Daniel Kearns, are quality players and if they start putting away the chances they’re creating during games, they could go on a run and get back up the table.
They’ll need to do it soon though because they’re already six points behind Shamrock Rovers and the longer the gap stays like that, the harder it will be for them to make it up as the season goes on.
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