Connacht manager Padraic Joyce during the Allianz GAA Football Inter-Provincial Series Briefing at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile
By John Harrington
Galway football manager, Pádraic Joyce, admits he still “has nightmares” about his team’s All-Ireland SFC Final defeat to Armagh and hasn’t been able to bring himself to watch a recording of the match.
He admires how Armagh executed their game-plan on the day, but from a Galway point of view it still feels like a huge opportunity missed because their conversion rate wasn’t as good as it could have been.
“It's a sickener, there's no doubt about that, I still have nightmares about it,” says Joyce. “I said to the boys afterwards, we'll regret it probably until we take our last breath in this world. But we had a great chance. Look, hats off to Armagh.
“You can't deny they won the game. They came down with their game plan. They won the game by a point. But if someone told me on the Sunday morning, Armagh would score 1-11 and beat you...all that kind of stuff.
“You can look back at it any way you want. It's hard to look back at it. I haven't watched the game properly yet.
“It's just hard to bring myself down to see it. For the first couple of weeks after the match, you're just keeping your head down, avoiding people. It's a lonely place to be, no doubt about it, but the buck stops with the manager at the end of the day.
“We understand that. There's no question about that. Got away to Spain for a couple of weeks and walked the legs of myself out there trying to wonder where we went wrong.
“Again, we weren't clinical enough on the day, we didn't score enough. Simple as that.
“We missed 13 shots out of 26 shots. It's not good enough to win a game. It's something we had focused on during the year. The disappointing part for us as a group was that was stuff we went after.
“We haven't done that during the year in games. I think we won five of the eight games by a point. We just stayed composed in the games.”
Dejected Galway manager Pádraic Joyce and Paul Conroy after the GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship Final match between Armagh and Galway at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Daire Brennan/Sportsfile
Joyce admits probably would have stepped down as Galway manager had they won the All-Ireland Final, but the pain of the defeat and the determination in the panel to come back stronger next year convinced him they have unfinished business as a collective.
“I've met the lads since,” says Joyce. “I always meet them three or four weeks after the final. In fairness to the lads, there were 35 or 38 that showed up in the room. The three that weren't there, one got engaged and was away. Two lads were working
“There's a huge kind of grá among the players to go back and go at it again straight away. That probably made up my mind as well about staying for another year with them. The lads are hurting. We're all hurting.
“Overall, if I look back at from where we were, from the first league match in Mayo, getting beat by eight points in Pearse Stadium, to where we ended up, we had some monumental games during the year with Dublin, Donegal, that kind of stuff.
“The development of the squad is huge as well. We now have probably a good bunch of players in Galway.
“We're watching club championships at the minute. There's probably not too many out there, one or two, that we take in. that's not in the current squad. We probably have the best that's in the county available to us. That's good.
“We have a few more, Peter Cooke and these lads are back playing again at the club. We'll chat to them and see if they're interested in coming back in again. We're disappointed, don't get me wrong, but I think we have to look forward, we can't look back all the time. We're not in a bad place.”
In attendance are, from left, Ulster manager Kieran Donnelly, Geoff Sparling, Chief Customer Officer Allianz Ireland, Munster representive Paul Shankey, Leinster manager Dessie Dolan, Mark Brennan, Head of Marketing Allianz Ireland and Connacht manager Padraic Joyce during the Allianz GAA Football Inter-Provincial Series Briefing at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile
Joyce manages the Connacht team that will compete in the Allianz Interprovincial series this weekend when the Football Review Committee’s proposed rule enhancements will be road-tested.
He’s keeping an open mind on just how positive an impact the rule enhancements will have, but is hopeful they will encourage teams to kick the ball more.
“I think players, the more football they can play, it's called football for a reason to use the foot,” says Joyce. "It's gone out of the game, no doubt about that.
“And you can blame us as managers and coaches for taking it out of the game, but sometimes you have to adapt to what's in front of you.
“We got hugely criticised here for the way we played in the final in our own quarters in Galway, but there was no point kicking the ball into six Armagh fellas standing in front of Damian Comer.
“So, things have to change a little bit. If you can get a bit more foot into the game, a bit more speed, a bit more movement, players will love that. Players want to just play ball and do one-on-one contests as much as they can, but it's not always going to be that case. because you see this year, your inside forwards, when they beat a man, there's a second man there, there's a third man there.
“And most counties, you have to nullify two or three top forwards. You want to limit their scoring threat. Teams will sacrifice two or three players and allow an opposition cornerback or full-back to be free. That's the problem in the current situation.
“Look, there's definitely something to change. There's too many teams going out playing football not to lose, instead of going out trying to win games. So, if we can get a few rules out of this, I think the ball back to the keeper is a big one.
“I think the tap and go is a huge one. That'll bring a lot of speed into the game. And the cynical fouling that takes place without it being a black card to allow the game to move forward 40, 50 metres is a big one. And obviously the clamp down as well on remonstrating with the officials, that kind of stuff. We'll get over that one on the sideline.”
