Mulholland taken aback by margin of victory

Galway manager Alan Mulholland was the first to admit last Sunday afternoon in Ruislip that the prospect of enjoying a 19 point winning margin against London never entered his head last week.

Over recent years, teams like Mayo, Sligo and Leitrim struggled to come out of Ruislip with a result and Mulholland had his side well warned not to expect anything handy from their London hosts.

“To be honest I’m a little taken aback at the way we won this game. We had expected a far tighter contest and last week I was looking forward to this match with a certain amount of trepidation.

“London had come in with a very low profile and we had heard that they had done well against Louth in a challenge match but as it turned out they weren’t nearly as strong as they were last year,” said Mulholland.

London’s weakness though wasn’t of his making and the Galway manager was very satisfied at the manner in which his side went about their task on Sunday.

“We were very wary of London hitting us with a quick start and getting some early scores on the board. Then they’d have the crowd behind them and build up a bit of momentum but instead it was Galway that got off to a flier.

“We were very sharp in the opening minutes and the early scores settled us down. I thought we played with a lot of pace and moved the ball very quickly — that’s our strong point and the way we have to play the game,” he said.

He said that while the start of this year’s National League had been a difficult time for Galway they had put in big displays against Down, Armagh and Monaghan.

“It’s always better to finish the league strongly and that’s what we did this year. The younger players are beginning to get that vein of experience that’s important at this level and I suppose that when we got the chances today we were very clinical — we killed off the match early on and that was good.”

However before he left a jam-packed Ruislip on Sunday evening, his thoughts were already switched to the Saturday evening of June 21 when his side travel to Markievicz Park for the Sky Sports Connacht semi-final clash with Sligo.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Sentinel.