Another defeat puts Lilywhites recruitment under scrutiny

It was a bad Good Friday Night for Dundalk as they went down to their second straight home league defeat in a row. This is the first time that this has happened to manager Stephen O'Donnell since he took over in December 2021.

The strength of Dundalk's push for Europe last season lay in their magnificent home record. They lost only one game in the entire season of 2022 at home. They turned Oriel into a fortress. Already after just eight games they have lost twice.

Again, the defence was in chaos at times. The midfield was poor too. And John Martin being played as a striker is just not the answer. His effort and commitment were top class. But he is just not the type of striker that looks like getting too many goals in that position.

Supporters can say that the team's huge dip in form in the past few weeks has coincided with a renewal of Pat Hoban's hamstring injury from last year. This should not be the case, as the success of a whole team should not revolve around one player. But Hoban is badly missed.

The new players signed on loan and on contract are beginning to put in below par performances as well. I have heard explanations that these players have yet to fully gel with the other players. I'm sorry, I just do not agree with this.

But the new signings are not the only reason why there has been a sudden slump. The entire team have hit into a very poor run of form.

Dundalk started without Daniel Kelly and rightly so. Daniel had a recurrence of the injury that kept him out of the side for much of last season. He did come on as a sub in the Shamrock Rovers game last Friday week. However, he had only trained one day that week, which was 24 hours earlier.

Daniel trained last Monday week. But he was then sidelined with a bad flu which kept him away from Oriel all last week. He recovered from the flu and returned to Oriel on Friday. He went straight into the squad and was used as a sub in the latter stages of the second half.

Stephen O'Donnell kept Greg Sloggett on the bench on Friday night. I thought that he must have been injured. But the manager confirmed in his post-match press conference that he left Sloggett on the bench to protect him from playing so many games given the serious injury he picked up in the latter stages of last season.

Robbie Benson was of course suspended, while Pat Hoban and Cameron Elliott were also missing through injury. Ryan O'Kane came back into the team in midfield for the suspended Benson. Hayden Muller was slotted back in as centre half. Wasiri Williams was left on the bench. Johannes came in at midfield for Greg Sloggett. 

Lack of Depth?

One only has to look at the Dundalk bench to see that it is not as strong as it should be. This goes back to what I said at the beginning of the season. Dundalk failed to sign any top-quality players from Ireland.

They also allowed a quality defender from the academy, Emmanuel Adegboyega, to go to Drogheda. This obviously had to do with the contract they were offering him.  

He was only offered the minimum payment contract at Oriel. It's not hard to guess that neighbours Drogheda United monitored the situation and when they saw what was happening with Emmanuel, they offered him a better contract.

Emmanuel is a Dundalk man. To see an academy player, who has the quality to do well in the Premier Division of the League of Ireland, just walk away from Oriel because he was only offered the minimum contract is very annoying.

Last Friday he was sent off in the Drogheda United vs Derry City game at the Brandywell. But his 10 man team fought bravely and came away with a shock 1-0 win.

It allowed Drogheda to jump over Dundalk in the League standings as Stephen O'Donnell's men dropped from third to sixth place as a result of the Sligo defeat.

Emmanuel has been linked to English side Blackpool in recent weeks. There are talented players in Ireland who surely could have been signed by Dundalk. It's hit and miss when you go to the UK to sign players.

The first four players signed by Dundalk arrived late enough at Oriel. The on-loan signings came in very late. There were players on the market who were top notch. Dundalk were linked to them. Why is it they lost the race for them?

Dundalk deny Stephen O'Donnell was not unable to sign the players he wanted. Chairman Sean O'Connor was adamant earlier in the season that he sat down last November with Stephen and agreed the four new players they would be signing.

They were duly signed just before the start of the season. O'Donnell has confirmed that what the chairman said was correct. But I find it very difficult to understand that the manager would not have had League of Ireland players on his shopping list.

Dare I say it that the money O'Donnell needed to rebuild his team was just not there or was not on offer? And maybe it was because of the tight budgetary constraints they were imposing that he had to concentrate on the UK for players. If that were the case, then they should have said it.

I asked Stephen O'Donnell was it correct to say he targeted the four players from the UK when he spoke to the Chairman back in November. He said the chairman was correct and that these were the four players he wanted.

He got them all right. But his pre-season signings, let alone the on loan players,  have left me wondering if they are good enough to help Dundalk be a force in the league this season.

O’Donnell

Stephen O'Donnell says that the winning goal for Sligo was a very sloppy one to give away. The Dundalk boss said to concede the goal was so disappointing. He says there was no other way to say it, they were extremely disappointed overall.

Yet he mentioned how after going 1-0 down, he thought his side responded very well. He told me his side were the dominant team the first half. He thought his side started the second half well also.

The game then became a bit of a helter-skelter between both sides. Stephen says that the goal Dundalk gave up at the end was a really poor one.

When I said it was now two home defeats in a row and asked him what does he do now, he stressed how it's easy when they are winning, as everything is glowing.

O'Donnell says the defeats were like anything in life, just setbacks. He sterssed the club, the coaching staff and the players have had a couple of setbacks, but that the substance of their character will be in how Dundalk react to the low points.

I said to the Dundalk boss that some of the performances from his players were not good. He replied that he did not think that Dundalk had reached their full potential, from a team point of view. He did tell me that you can get nights when players are a little subpar.

The Galwegian says that Pat Hoban has been making great progress. He trained on Saturday morning. He said he will just see how Pat gets on in the training sessions and see where it will be taken from there. He also confirmed to me that Hoban has yet to train with the rest of the team. 

Stephen says that overall he is very disappointed with the defeats to Shamrock Rovers and Sligo. But he is not naive enough to think that everything was going to be plain sailing with his team. He says life is not like that. He says it is how you react to the disappointments.

Stephen O'Donnell has a great attitude towards adapting to disappointments. He takes a very philosophical approach to games and all that comes with them, the positives and the negatives.

This is exactly what his team needs now, as they are not playing well at all and have not done so for some time, even before the recent defeats.

The manager must remain strong and guide them out of the current dip in form and also the recent slide down the table. It's very easy for a team to get into a losing cycle. We have all seen this in the past with other Dundalk teams.

Oriel Park

It will be interesting to see if the owners make a move to buy Oriel Park outright. I can't see any advantage in them doing so, as they will still not benefit from any public funding for ground development, just as they cannot now while ground is in private hands.

I would like to see the ground sold to the council so that Oriel can be used as a public or community facility. Dundalk could then use it as leaseholders and the council could fund the development required.

It's an awful pity Dundalk did not have the slick knowledge and methods of fundraising that Louth GAA brought together to build a new GAA stadium at DKIT.

The offer was there twice for Dundalk to take it on. Sadly, one was to an owner who was on his way out of Oriel. It would have been very difficult for the other owner to take on the project when it became available for a second time. But it could and should have been done. 

As far as the current owners are concerned, I feel there is quite a bit of detachment between them and the supporters. It's time for them to come and meet the supporters in an open forum and discuss their future plans.

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Final Thoughts

Meanwhile the FAI has condemned as unacceptable what looked like an alleged Kung Fu attack on a referee in Dundalk last week in a game in the North-East League. The incident led to the referee being taken to hospital and the game being abandoned. It happened last Thursday night. 

The match was abandoned after the referee, who was from Dundalk, was injured when a person launched a flying kick at him.

The President of the Irish Soccer Referees Society William Long says the incident was a shocking and appalling attack. FAI chief executive Jonathan Hill says there is no place in Irish football for anyone found guilty of assaulting a referee.

The FAI say they will adapt a Zero tolerance policy to anyone found guilty of assaults on Match officials. The fixture in the North East Football League was abandoned after 63 minutes when a person apparently  ran at the referee and lunged and kicked him in mid-air.

The incident was videoed and has been widely circulated on social media. Gardai have confirmed they are investigating an assault at around 9:40 pm at Muirhevnamor.

The game involved local club Bay United and a club called Sporting Ballyjamesduff from Cavan. The Ballyjamesduff Club say that they are extremely disappointed at what happened during the game and that they will fully co-operate with the investigation into the incident. They say action will be taken in light of the incident.

The NEFL say that they are aware of an incident and that they will be conducting an investigation once they have a report on the game.

The NEFL say their committee has been made aware of the abandonment of Thursday night's Division one League match between Bay FC and Sporting BJD FC after 85 minutes. The NEFL committee are to conduct an investigation.

Next up its Dundalk v Derry city at Oriel at 3PM next Sunday. The game was due to be played next Friday. But it's been put back 48 hours due to the visit of President Joe Biden to Dundalk this week.

Have a safe week. Be careful out there and remember to look after each other.