Louth set for final National Hurling League tie against Garden County

Louth senior hurlers face their final test of the Allianz National Hurling League, Division Three campaign when they travel to Echelon Park, Aughrim to take on Wicklow on Saturday at 2.00pm.

Joint managers Paddy McArdle and Diarmuid Murphy accept the challenge will be tough, but insist their squad will travel with belief.

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DM: "Yeah, it will be tight for sure. We didn't play too well against Donegal ourselves that day. You can see yourself from the scoreline; it wasn't great. But we don't fear any of these teams. We're just trying to get our best group of players for that match.

"We're looking forward to the challenge at Wicklow. We played them last year in a friendly down there as well. We were equipped fairly well that day ourselves, so we'd be hoping to get something out of the game if we could."

With Division Three status already secured, the game could be looked at as a free hit, but McArdle insists there will be no drop in standards.

PMCA: "Yes and no, it's a free hit. It's a free hit in terms of we are safe from relegation, but we can't make a league final. But we also don't want to go to Wicklow and let our guard down a wee bit, and maybe they put 15 or 20 points on us.

"We want to go with the attitude that we have to win this game. Going back to the first question, had we beaten Roscommon, we'd have been sitting very close to Wicklow as well.

"We'd have been pushing for promotion too, had we beaten them, and we probably should have beaten them. I think maybe we've answered the question to a certain extent that we're well able to hurl at this level. It may just be getting the job done now in tight games."

Difficult preparation

Preparation has not been straightforward in recent weeks, with poor weather limiting access to suitable surfaces.

PMCA: "Well, hopefully the rain will stop over the next few days, and we'll get a pitch that's good enough for hurling. Because, unfortunately, our hands have been tied on where we can play. The pitch here at Darver just isn't fit for hurling, unfortunately.

"We tried to get a numerous amount of club teams, we went around the clubs to ask for pitches, and they're all in the same boat.

"We know what's happened; it rained for 50-odd days there. They weren't going to give their pitch out for us to wreck them in a one-off game or whatever.

"So maybe when the surface tightens up a wee bit now, I'm not exactly sure where the game is. They're probably playing it in Aughrim, which is always a good enough field.

"That should help us get that first touch right on a better pitch, and it should stand to us. It's funny to hear because the two games that we won were both away, and the games that we lost were at home.

"I'm not saying we're playing better away from home, but the pitches are better or whatever it is because that is not a hurling pitch out there."

Injuries

Injuries have also limited the impact of key players such as Ciarán McKelvey and Andrew La Touch Cosgrave, both of whom the management believes can raise the level of the entire squad when fully fit.

PMCA: "At the minute, we're not getting the best out of them; one of them is carrying an injury, and the other one is trying to get back to full fitness. So we haven't seen the best of them yet. If I'm honest, they're both operating at around 40% or 50%.

"We've seen flashes of McKelvey on the first day out in Armagh of what he can do. He was very unlucky; he should have ended the game with 2-7 or 3-7. He ended up with 1-7, and he's been injured since then.

"We talked about it in the last interview, we've been patching lads up, trying to get them through the games, we're lucky now that we've got a three-week break there, so it gives us a wee bit of a chance to get them patched up.

Murphy says the experienced players have helped drive standards in training as the squad buys into the longer-term plan.

DM: "The boys are loving it, even around the squad. We asked how they feel the training is going and everything else. They're delighted with how it's going. When you have the likes of McKelvey and La Touche, it raises the standard a bit in training as well.

"Boys will have to up their game because these boys have played at a higher level, so we have to get to their level."

Mixed league

Looking back on the league as a whole, Murphy feels survival in Division Three was the minimum target, although he admits there were chances to achieve more.

DM: "Okay, just okay. It should have been better to be quite honest. We were late coming in, it was mid-December before we started training, so it was late coming in.

"We sort of set our stall out if we can stay up this year, we'd be happy. If we had had a couple of wins, you could be looking at promotion, but that's the way it is. With injuries and everything else, the squad is small at the moment.

"We could do with a few more numbers around the squad, but look, happy to stay up, I suppose that was the main goal at the start of the season."

McArdle believes the Wee County has shown enough to prove they belong at this level.

PMCA: "Yes and no, I honestly thought at the start of the league that we could have beaten every team in this division. That might be delusional for me, but I've seen enough over the last lock of years to know that this team is well able to hurl at this level.

"Have I changed my mind? Probably not. Bar Donegal, we've put in a good shift in nearly every game. Tyrone may have caught us on the hop at the start of the second half.

"But every performance, I think we're building. We are hampered with injuries to a couple of key men, and those couple of key men change our team an awful lot. Change the shape of our team, and how we want to play.

"If we have them lads in them positions, it leaves it that we can start switching other lads around. Putting them in their proper position around the field at the minute.

"We're going into games at the minute with not exactly the team that we want on the field, we have lads that are starters, we have lads that are finishers. Some lads are great coming off the bench for us and have been this last couple of years, and we're missing that impact at the minute.

"We're missing three, four, or five men coming off the bench. I'm not happy with the league, to be honest with you. I thought we could have made a league final, and we just slipped at that hurdle with Roscommon.

"It would have put us level with Donegal on points that weekend. I know there was a few other games that had to be played, looking back on it now, I'm not happy.

"But at the same time, I'm reasonably happy that we're safe now, we get to play the higher level of hurling next year, and that's massively important for us as well going forward."