A lot done, but more still to do as Dundalk prepare for next season

Stephen O’Donnell was a busy man in the run up to Christmas as he continued to strengthen his squad for the coming season.

With just six weeks left until the start of the season O’Donnell has landed a major coup by re-signing his goalkeeper Nathan Shepperd. The Dundalk boss had been questioned after almost every game as the season came to a close about Shepperd’s future.

The Dundalk boss was left in a situation since the start of last season knowing that Shepperd’s future could have been secured for the 2023/24 season had the club agreed to give him a new contract at the start of 2023.

But the club did not go down that road and instead opted to just take up the one year option they had on the keeper. What Nathan was looking for was very little for a new two-year contract.

The club decided otherwise and his future was always in doubt for 2024. This was despite the fact that he was in the top 3 keepers of the season list for 2022 as compiled by the Irish Soccer Writers.

Dundalk’s then owners did not even have to look at this list as they saw how good he was in 2022. Shepperd was a key man in many of Dundalk’s good results.

This guided Stephen O’Donnell’s team to a third placed finish in the league and a place in the Europa Conference League. Dundalk clinched the automatic place for Europe that season. Season 2023 turned out somewhat differently with Dundalk just missing out on fourth place to Shelbourne.

The race for Europe went down to the final day. It was a costly miss, as had Dundalk made it to the Conference League it would have been worth up to 500,000 euro just starting off.

That they missed out on Europe, I would say, prompted the club’s owners to move on. Now it is in the hands of the very likeable owner, Brian Ainscough. Brian has already shown a great openness to speak to the media.

This is like a breath of fresh air. Brian’s hope for Dundalk is for them to return to Europe. It would be some feat by Dundalk were they able to do this. But the signing of Nathan Shepperd means Dundalk will have a leader again in defence.

Nathan had told me in interview after interview that he wanted to stay at Dundalk. But obviously all issues had to be right for him. I am really glad to see the former Welsh under 21 keeper deciding to stay.

I am very worried about the Dundalk defence. Hayden Muller, Andy Boyle, Archie Davies and Louie Annesley are the key defenders the Dundalk boss has on his books so far.

Dundalk need another centre half as well as at least two full backs. They need to replace Darragh Leahy, who was an in contract player for this season, but let go by Brian Gartland and Stephen O’Donnell during the close season. The club also needs at least one if not two centre backs.

Louie Annesley is expected to return. The Gibraltarian international missed out most of the season through serious illness and injury. He is still a young player, but is prone to mistakes that Dundalk can not afford to be giving away.

Andy Boyle is as solid a defender that one could look for. He made a marvellous contribution to Dundalk’s very good finish to the season in 2023. It was very good in that they recorded victories week after week in the final few games and were also able to pick up away wins.

But Andy Boyle was also hit by a lot of injuries and missed some very key games as a result. When he did not play at the back, the defence looked quite a lot out of sorts. He was also, at times, left on the bench by the manager, which caused surprise.

I remember asking the Dundalk boss a number of times if Andy was injured, when I saw him on the bench. I was told that he had recovered from injury. To be fair to O’Donnell he was more than likely deciding to rest him and not rush him back in case he got a recurrence of an injury that dogged him for long spells during the season.

Hayden Muller is another player expected to return to the team. Hayden is a good player, but I would definitely feel another full back at his position is needed.

Archie Davis was the revelation of last season’s team so much so that Shamrock Rovers wanted him. I would have no problem playing Archie every week. He is an excellent player.

Dundalk do have a problem at midfield. It needs much more physicality. New signing Dara Keane is an unknown quantity to me. He is a defensive midfielder. All one can say is that I hope he can do the business.

Paul Doyle is an excellent player to have at midfield. But he has been dogged by injuries over the past two seasons since he arrived at Oriel. If he can avoid injury it would be a massive boost for Stephen O’Donnell.

Robbie Benson has re-signed. He is out on his own. He is an excellent player. But he has missed much of the past two seasons through injury. Let’s hope that can be avoided.

Dundalk have also re-signed John Mountney. John missed the last two seasons with Pat’s and Dundalk through injury. Stephen O’Donnell is taking a risk here. John has been a great asset to Dundalk in his long career at Oriel. Let’s hope it works out.

Conor Malley is believed to be staying. He can do a job for Dundalk. But maybe this would not be on a weekly basis. Sam Durrant seems to have a lot of talent. He will be a good fringe player.

This could be Ryan O’Kane’s season. He is one of the most talented players to come out of Oriel in quite a while. It will be Ryan’s third season to feature in the first team. He is bound to be a regular in the first team.

Daryl Horgan is another hugely talented player. Again, he will be used on a frequent basis. He has huge creativity and will still score many goals.

Pat Hoban is still a Dundalk player, despite being told by Stephen O’Donnell that he can find another club. Derry City are very definitely waiting to pounce. Hoban will be a huge loss to Dundalk if he goes. There is no doubt that should Dundalk not have a good start, the manager will come under a lot of pressure from supporters for letting him go.

Dundalk have decided to keep Cameron Elliott. No disrespect to the young Scot, he never showed any evidence last season that he has the prolific goal scoring abilities of Pat Hoban.

In 28 appearances Cameron just managed a single goal for Dundalk last season. But there are very few players in the League of Ireland who have the abilities of Patrick Hoban. At the age of 32 Pat will still go straight into the Derry side or whatever team he ends up with.

Dundalk have been linked to Crusaders player Stephen Mallon. Stephen O’Donnell was at Solitude to watch the attacking left midfielder last Saturday week. Mallon is highly rated. Whether Dundalk can get him remains to be seen. Mallon has just returned from injury.

There was a full series of games in the Irish League on Saint Stephen’s day. I have no idea if Brian Gartland or Stephen O’Donnell ventured north to see any of the games. They certainly were not at the Newry Showgrounds where the locals were taking on mid table Glenavon.

Newry are rock bottom of the Premier Division. They were hammered by four goals to nil by Glenavon. Newry had John McGovern playing in midfield. Dundalk have been strongly linked with him.

Sadly for John he failed to impress. On the basis of what I saw I doubt very much if Dundalk will be looking for him. But then that’s unfair of me to say that.

Newry are a side that have not won a game in 12 matches. Indeed, they have only won a handful of games in the Premier Division this season. The team played with no confidence whatsoever. This is endemic in the Newry side at the moment.

No matter how good a player Newry might have, they are bound to be playing with no confidence if they are bottom of the table.

It was no surprise to me then when I heard that the Newry boss Gary Boyle was standing down. Newry look set for Division one unless they can get a decent manager in.

Whether Stephen O’Donnell does make a move for John McGovern, who knows. He would want to be one hundred percent sure that the player can do a job for him.

I happened to meet two Dundalk supporters at the Newry game. We spoke about Dundalk’s prospects for next season. The two Dundalk supporters both said they could not see Stephen O’Donnell’s side making a big impact next season. They believed that the squad just does not have the depth required to push for a top four place. I would have to agree.

Now, of course, there is plenty of time between now and the start of the season. But O’Donnell will have to go outside the country to get those players even if he could stretch his budget. Shamrock Rovers, Pat’s, Derry and Shelbourne should again make up the top four. Bohemians, Galway and Drogheda United should follow further on.

The bottom three I think may consist of Dundalk, Sligo and Waterford. I just feel Dundalk need to bring in at least seven new players. That’s over and above any new players brought in or re-signed at present.

Manchester United could not score goals over five games, until they put three past Aston Villa last week. The main reason was that they just do not have a striker. I keep going back to this.

Dundalk have the best striker in the league. Keep him and Dundalk will be well up the table. He will score. Dundalk will still need an injection of new players even if Hoban stays. Let him go and they will struggle for goals big time.

There is a Dundalk man managing Glenavon. Stephen McDonnell had to retire from soccer at the age of just 22 when it was discovered he had a heart problem. He has been involved in coaching ever since.

He was the head of the Dundalk soccer academy in 2020 when he was brought in by Jim Magilton. He had been boss at Warrenpoint as well for a period of time. Stephen has a UEFA Youth A licence and is a UEFA senior A licence holder. He played professionally in Scotland and Ireland before being forced to retire due to his heart difficulty.

He walked into the Glenavon club in September 2023 as manager. His team were in the drop zone. But he has been doing an unbelievable job since his arrival. The Dundalk man has led his team to seven league wins and a draw.

The 22 points he has gained for Glenavon ensures they will not be in a relegation scrap. They also have a reasonable chance of getting into the top six in the League when it splits in two. Stephen could be leading his side into a European competition yet. To be realistic, it’s doubtful that would happen this year.

Stephen says communication within the club is excellent between all the stakeholders. New ideas and additional players have been a huge contributor to Glenavon’s prospects. McDonnell is a full-time manager at Glenavon. But his assistant another

Dundalk man Simon Kelly is part-time as are the rest of the club personnel. Sucess will be needed before he sees his club going full time. But that is the way the Irish league is going. Stephen says his side are three points from the top six. They will just take it a game at a time and see what happens.

McDonnell also says he worked with the Shelbourne academy for the past season or so. Well, it will be very interesting to see how his side gets on as the season progresses.

Simon Kelly, another Dundalk man, spoke about his job as assistant manager at the Lurgan club. Simon is a former Dundalk FC player and played many of his games under former manager Trevor Anderson during the bleakest of times in the First Division.

Simon revealed that he and Stephen lost their first four games in charge and were bottom of the table. Kelly says they picked up their first win after that and since then it’s all been very good.

He says hard work and the players willingness to listen has played a big part in the turnaround at Glenavon. After losing their first four games the two Dundalk men managing the club won their next five games shooting the team up the table.

Simon says there is good quality in the Glenavon side. He believes that on their day his team can beat anybody in the Irish League. Simon says he was not with a club when he got a call from Stephen McDonnell asking him to join Glenavon.

Simon revealed he was actually on his honeymoon when he got the call from the new Glenavon manager. He said once he was asked, he could not say no. He could not wait to get back into football.

Simon lives in Dundalk and travels to Lurgan where Glenavon are based. The first team train twice a week and play on Saturdays. Six months before arriving to take up his job at Glenavon he was in charge of the Dundalk FC under fourteen and fifteen academy teams for the previous two years.

Simon says he loved his time at Dundalk and working with the academy teams. But he says it was so time consuming that he had to depart the club as he had to get his marriage preparations in place.

Simon was full of praise for Dundalk as a club. He says that Stephen O’Donnell is a top class manager who gets the very best out of his players. Simon says there is a very good management structure at Oriel from the senior team right down to the Academy teams.

Simon says he has never seen his old manager Trevor Anderson since he left in 2005. Simon says he will always be grateful to the former Dundalk boss, as it was Trevor who gave him his debut with Dundalk. He says he made his debut with Trevor when he came on as a substitute against Kilkenny.

The following season he made his full debut against Bray again under Anderson. Dundalk were beaten 3-1. Sadly they were bleak times for Dundalk when the former Linfield manager was boss.

Dundalk won around 11 league games out of a possible 58 in division one. The club finished at its lowest league position ever when they finished third from bottom of Division one. It took an end of season win over Kilkenny at Buckley Park, to ensure Dundalk would not have to apply for re-election to the FAI.

It’s great to see the new owner of the club bringing in a new grounds person and a financial director. A commercial manager type role is also being considered as part of the new management staff. This will continue to improve the foundation stones and structure of the club. It’s a great move by Brian Aincough.

Have a very happy and healthy New Year. Please remember to be careful out there and to look after each other.