Galway United defeated Derry City 2-0 at Eamonn Deacy Park thanks to goals from Kevin Devaney and Vinny Faherty to secure a place in the final eight of the EA Sports Cup. Speaking to reporters following the match, Tribesmen manager Shane Keegan was
Galway United defeated Derry City 2-0 at Eamonn Deacy Park thanks to goals from Kevin Devaney and Vinny Faherty to secure a place in the final eight of the EA Sports Cup.
Speaking to reporters following the match, Tribesmen manager Shane Keegan was happy to take the win, despite the performance not being ideal.
“That was, probably, the polar opposite to every game we’ve played this year. At least four of our performances were better than what we put out there.
“Obviously, we’ll take that all day – if we can play poorly at times and get a win out of it,” the Laois native said.
Nevertheless, there were enough positives to satisfy Keegan including impressive performances from new faces. Robert Spelman, Gary Kinneen and Aaron Conway.
“There’s probably about six positives out of tonight because we got game time into Kevin Devaney and Gavan Holohan on their way back from injury, you had three young boys making their competitive debuts who I thought all did well to various different degrees, you had Vinny [Faherty on the scoresheet – that’s a plus.
“We were able to rest key players who had played nearly every minute of every game and still get through to the next round, momentum going into Friday night and we’re into the quarter final of a cup we’d like to win, so there’s positive galore.”
Up next for Galway is a Premier Division clash against Limerick and Keegan remained upbeat about his side’s chances against the newly-promoted outfit.
“For all the pressure and us not being fantastic, there’s one defeat in our last six. I mean, that’s decent going, when you look at the basic stats. Now, look, I was down in Limerick on Saturday night and they were excellent. It’s a really, really tough game but we won’t be short on confidence now or a bit of belief,” he said.
The gaping chasm left by the late Ryan McBride has considerably de-railed the Candystripes’ season and Derry manager Kenny Shiels is all too aware that the absence of a consistent captain is hurting them on the pitch.
“I think it’s epitomised when you look at that’s our fourth captain in six games and it just shows you that we’re having a little bit of bad luck. We can’t feel sorry for ourselves, but we are having a lot of bad luck.
“Even against Finn Harps we dominated the ball. We dominated it [against Galway], but just didn’t get the rubs, and I don’t want to take anything away from Galway but I felt that we were definitely unfortunate.”
Shiels felt his players played well against the Tribesmen and knows his team are moving in the right direction in the lead up to another clash against Connacht opposition.
“I feel that if we show the same confidence, I think we can go to Sligo [Rovers] and win now. I don’t see why we can’t. We’re as a good as Sligo,” the Derry manager said.
Trevor Murray
