Maughan does the damage as Galway prove different class

Date Published: {J}

Galway 4-13 Leitrim 0-11

Noel Carney

THIS comprehensive victory earns Galway minor footballers a place in the Connacht Championship final where they will meet Roscommon, but the limited challenge posed by a spirited if rather poor Leitrim side at sun-splashed Carrick-on-Shannon last Saturday means that there are still many questions to be answered before we can gauge the true worth of Tommie Joyce’s team.

The fact that Galway got two goals and two points in the opening five minutes gave them a huge boost and served to demoralise the hosts, but it also may have taken the edge off the visitors who started to coast as they only added four more points from there to the break while Leitrim, battling gamely with limited resources, fought back courageously with 0-6 in the same period.

Worryingly for the Galway management, Leitrim were winning a huge amount of possession in the middle of the field during the first half and their number 8, Feilim McHugh, kicked three fine points while his centre-field partner Conor Farrell also got on the score-sheet after the interval. In particular, Leitrim were more adept at winning breaking ball in tight exchanges.

It wasn’t that the towering Galway duo of Enda Walsh and Gearóid Canavan were playing badly but the half-time introduction of Adrian Nolan released Shane Geoghegan to shore up that area temporarily while Sean Moran, who was brilliant against Sligo in the opening game, made a huge difference to the sector when he joined the fray after being held in reserve due to a knee injury.

The visitors got that aforementioned great start when Shane Walsh pointed after taking a Gearóid Armstrong pass after 30 seconds and their first goal quickly followed when a superb move that started in defence with Conor Cunningham and team captain James Shaughnessy, and continued by Shane Maughan and Armstrong, ended with livewire corner-forward Johnny Kelleher expertly driving to the net. Armstrong then made it 1-2 to 0-0 from a tricky angle.

For more, read this week's Connacht Sentinel.