Date Published: 23-Jun-2011

Dara Bradley

THE Galway minor football squad will look to put a disappointing league campaign behind them when they face Sligo in the quarter-final of the Connacht Championship at Markievicz Park this Saturday evening (6pm).

Galway, beaten All-Ireland semi-finalists in 2010, lost to Mayo, Roscommon and Sligo in the league earlier this year and beat just Longford and Leitrim during the spring campaign, although manager Tommie Joyce (Killererin) and his selectors John Concannon (Milltown), Terry O’Regan (St. James’) and Michael Culhane (Clarinbridge) will have their charges primed for this make-or-break clash, their target all year.

Galway have won the previous three championship meetings between the counties at this level – by 0-3 to 0-9 last year, 1-5 to 0-7 in 2009 and 0-11 to 0-9 in 2008 – but the Yeats County got the upper hand over the Tribesmen by the narrowest of margins in this year’s league.

Galway supporters shouldn’t read too much into that defeat, however – at least six of the squad who have been selected for Saturday’s knock-out tie, were absent against Sligo as they were in action for their college, St. Jarlath’s.

No less than six of the starting XV, announced after training on Tuesday, were part of the St. Jarlath’s set up that fell just short of St. Colman’s of Newry in a thrilling Hogan Cup final at Croke Park in April, including Liam Silke, Conor Cunningham, Cathal Mulryan, Patrick Glynn, Shane Walsh and Ian Burke.

The management has also selected three of the survivors of last year’s campaign which ended in a 5-8 to 3-15 defeat to Cork at GAA HQ, including captain and full-back James Shaughnessy (Ballinasloe); and sharpshooters Conor Rabbitte (Kilkerrin/Clonberne) and Shane Maughan (St. Michael’s).

Nearly 20 from the squad have been sitting Leaving Certificate examinations for the past couple of weeks, which hasn’t helped preparations but Joyce is reasonably happy Galway will be ready for battle.

“The exams aren’t over until Thursday and the match is on Saturday but we’ve a lot of training done in the past few months,” he said. “We started trials in January and we gave everybody five or six trials. We kept everybody on board for a long time and had a squad of about 40 up until a few weeks ago. I’d say we should be okay but it’s the first game, it’s knockout, and so you don’t know how it will go, so you’d be nervous enough.

“If we were playing the game at home you’d obviously be more confident but we’d be happy enough with how we’ve prepared. Our forwards are sharp and if they all click on the day they should be hard to keep down. Having said that we’d have a nice balance all over the field. A lot of the Jarlath’s lads and guys from last year would be experienced enough, which should stand to them,” added Joyce.

The winners of this clash face an away match with Leitrim in the semi-final the following weekend and the winners of that take on the victors of Mayo v Roscommon, who square up in Castlebar this Sunday.

Galway: C. Gleeson; L. Silke, James Shaughnessy, C. Cunningham; E. Walsh, G. Canavan, C. Mulryan; S. Geoghegan, S. Moran; P. Glynn, S. Walsh, G. Kelly; C. Rabbitte, I. Burke, S. Maughan. Subs: D. McDonnell, C. Timmon, J. Killeen, C. Bohan, E. Walsh, M. Ó Bearra, A. Nolan, C. Seoige, S. Silke, J. Killeavy, G. Armstrong, S. Hughes, J. Kelleher, C. Lee, C. Flaherty.