‘Roscommon people should be proud of what we did’
It could be argued that it was the most impressive win in the history of Pádraig Pearses.
And yet the only topic of conversation for most neutrals after the Connacht club semi-final was referee Jerome Henry – the decisions he made in the closing stages of the contest, and the manner in which several Mountbellew-Moylough players and officials remonstrated with the Mayo native after the game.
More on that anon, but even if the game hadn’t ended in such controversial circumstances, there was a real sense after this game that Pádraig Pearses are continuing to push their game on to a new level. Pearses are now preparing to play Mayo champions Knockmore in the Connacht final on January 9 in Ballina.
By beating Corofin, Mountbellew-Moylough catapulted themselves into the shortlist of potential All-Ireland winners, and the additional break following the outbreak of Covid in the east Galway village meant that there were no questions of fatigue in the camp, as there might have been had Pearses played them hot on the heels of their last win over Ballinamore.
These two sides played incredibly solid, sound defensive football throughout the game – and while the purists may lament the lack of scores, Pearses manager Pat Flanagan was happy to wax lyrical about the quality of the contest, and the performance of his players.
“It was a testament to the two teams; it was a powerful performance from both of them. I’m not sure what it was like to look at but from my viewpoint everything was put into it, there was no quarter asked for, and it was one of those games where you feel privileged to be part of it,” said the Clara native and former Westmeath manager.
“What our players showed to dig so deep, to get that last point from Tom Butler, who was playing his first senior game for us this year, it goes to show how much he’s put in to get himself in a position to kick the winning point is unbelievable,” Flanagan continued.
“This team has stepped up to become who they can be. They were pretenders for a long time, even last year we should have done better than we did; we didn’t win the county final, but you do need to be finals consistently to compete in the Connacht championship. We missed out in 2019 because of that. We have the experience now... and we’ll take that into the final in two or three weeks’ time”.
Of course, the matter of the referee’s performance had to be addressed too, and perhaps understandably, the perspective on the two managers was very different. Former Galway All-Star Val Daly was the man in charge of his native Mountbellew-Moylough team, and he certainly disagreed with a number of the key decisions.
“The last five minutes wasn’t pretty from our point of view. The man in the middle makes the decisions, he made a couple of decisions we were baffled with, and most people in the crowd were baffled with,” Daly told reporters afterwards.
“One was a clear foul where our player, Barry McHugh, got his legs cut from under him. The second involved Barry as well, a good pass in from Michael (Daly) and a mark, hit the ground, you’re allowed a few seconds to get your hand up in the air, which he did, and the referee played on.”
“They wouldn’t allow our kickout by pulling and dragging our players around the place, which tactically is what Dublin did to Mayo in an All-Ireland final a couple of years ago. We needed to get that kickout away quickly, and instead of that, the referee was going around booking people and giving black cards. Common sense should have told him that we were a point down with a play left; we needed the ball and we weren’t interested in slowing the game up.
“His team and his officials have to live with the decisions they made on the day, unfortunately the players have to live with the decisions as well. But there’s no sour grapes from us, this is life on the road, this is football,” Daly added.
Suffice it to say, Flanagan’s take was different. “What am I supposed to say, that I’d give them the frees?” he asked.
“Over the course of the whole match, there were incidents where we felt we could have had frees, the real problem is when it’s at the last couple of minutes and then it’s controversial. There were incidents where we felt we could have got different calls but over the course of the game I think the referee did an excellent job, particularly in the conditions,” said Flanagan.
Turning back to his own team, Flanagan said: “This club itself has aspirations. There’s some clubs and counties that just wants to stick where they are; this club wants to go forward, they’ve shown that they want to go forward. The players know that and they’re matching that ambition. You’ve got massive leaders within the team and we’ve got a panel now. We’ve used 27 players after bringing in Tom Butler today; last year we used 19, I think that’s the difference.
“It’s a pity the final is not on before Christmas so our lads could have some time to themselves, but we’ll plan it out. We’ll put ourselves in the best position to be as fit as we possibly can to represent Pádraig Pearses and Roscommon. I honestly think that the people of Roscommon should be proud of what we did today,” he concluded.