Peadar Gardiner defends Mayo U-20s’ defeat to Leitrim

ONE win, one loss and one draw. Peadar Gardiner’s competitive record as Mayo U-20 manager is about as mixed as you could get.

But a loss to Leitrim, no matter how good they were, must surely dent the confidence of a team that came to Ballinamore with their chests still puffed from the previous week’s win over Galway?

The Mayo News put this to Gardiner.

“I wouldn’t agree with that statement at all,” he replied.

“Leitrim are a fine team and they battled hard against Galway. I know Galway beat them by nine points, but they were in that game with a few minutes to go and obviously they had a couple of seniors playing there today.”

The Crossmolina man was fulsome in his praise for the opposition, but unflinching in his assessment of where his team fell down.

“This is a tough game and we tried to prepare as best we could for it but we weren’t ready for the battle, that’s it, unfortunately,” he said.

“Obviously we had some goal chances, that’s the luck of the day, sometimes you take them, sometimes you don’t.

“We’re disappointed, conceding three goals. Obviously you won’t win many games conceding three goals today and that was the big platform for Leitrim getting them goals. We were chasing the game from the word ‘go’. We couldn’t catch up and that’s a credit to Leitrim.”

_{Leitrim U-20 manager Andy Moran with former team mate and Mayo U-20 selector Keith Higgins after the Leitrim U-20s' win over Mayo (Pic: Mayo GAA)}

It was a day of conflicting emotions for Andy Moran, whose own children were shouting for Mayo.

But the Ballaghadereen bomber was still as chirpy and smiley as ever after the game.

Was he expecting to be clutching the scalp of a former teammate in Ballinamore last Wednesday evening?

“You can’t say you’re expecting it until it actually happens, because I’m an optimistic sort of guy. Yee know me kind of well and I always suspect the best, but if I’m being honest with you I think we have a really good team,” Moran told reporters afterwards.

“I think we have some really really good players, players that I expect to go on to our senior team next year and it’s just an exciting time for Leitrim football. And again, did I expect it? No. I understand how good Mayo are.

“I seen against [St] Geralds, I seen them against [St] Colman’s, we know what Mayo can bring, we thought we had some really good players there tonight. We sacrificed our two senior players tonight in Barry [McNulty] and Jack [Casey] they can’t play on Sunday, so we took a big chance, and it paid off for us.”

Peadar Gardiner is like Andy Moran on Ritalin. He doesn’t bounce of the walls and ceilings, but is still unflinchingly optimistic about the future.

“This defeat certainly won’t define us, they’re a great bunch of lads and they’ll bounce back,” Gardiner said.

“They want to bounce back, they’re ambitious and they want this team to do well so we’ve a home game in Castlebar, we had great support the last day so we look forward to the challenge in two weeks.”

ENDS