Fiontan O Curraoin
With a number of players injured and college-tied, defending FBD Connacht Senior Football League champions Galway will name an experimental selection for their opening match of this year’s competition against Sligo.
Manager Kevin Walsh has been working off a provisional panel of about 50 players for the past few weeks, and is expected to give a few fresh faces their chance to impress.
“We’re all looking forward to getting back into a match situation again and after winning the FBD last year for the first time since 2009, there is no real pressure on us,” says Walsh.
“It is a good competition for giving players a ‘first chance’ at county football and lads who stay with us will develop over the course of the season – the FBD is a good starting-off point,” said Walsh.”
A few older hands will also be given their chance to prove a point in the coming weeks with the likes of Fiontán Ó Curraoin, Sean Armstrong, and Johnny Duane all back in harness after returning to the panel.
Sligo are also reinforced by some familiar faces this year with Ross Donovan, Stephen Gilmartin, Tony Taylor, and Stephen Coen back on the panel.
“Whether they all make it is another thing, it’s good to have the competition there,” said Sligo manager Niall Carew. “Galway will be a tough game, but look at it, they’re all tough, it’s a great game to get. It will be good for us and we’re looking forward to it.”
Mayo haven’t won an FBD League since 2012 and begin this year’s campaign with a home tie against **NUIG **as they bid to end that barren run.
27 members of their 2016 Championship squad are currently in South Africa on a team holiday, so they'll field an unfamiliar looking team.
The likes of 2016 All-Ireland U-21 medallists David Kenny, Fergal Boland, Liam Irwin and Michael Plunkett should feature, and there are call-ups too for Castlebar trio Rory Byrne, Donie Newcombe, and Neil Douglas.
Roscommon host IT Sligo in their first FBD match and come into the game on the back of two challenge-match defeats to Meath and Kildare. Despite those results, manager Kevin McStay is in a positive mood ahead of the new season.
“We are happy enough with how things are going,” he said. “We looked like beating Kildare but we gave away a soft goal at the end of the game but for the small amount of work we have done I thought we played well.
“I was very happy with the subs. Tadhg O’Rourke, Shane Killoran and Tom Fetherston all did very well and that’s what we want to do, to give the younger lads a chance. I was very happy overall with that Kildare game, it was a great workout for us,” he said.
“We are in good shape now and our injury list is small which is good too and we will be fielding a decent team on Sunday but we will be looking at all the players within the panel over the three games.
“We need lads to play games now. We will be upping the workload with regard to training in January and we need to do that and our target is Tyrone in the opening round of the league, but so far, so good.”
New Leitrim manager Benny Guckian begins his reign with a home match against GMIT and looks set to experiment after bringing a raft of new players into his panel.
“The reaction has been good, we have a lot of new faces, we have 12 new faces from last year's panel,” said Guckian.
“We have a lot of youth, we have eight under 21s on the panel, yet in saying that we have lots of experience too. We have Wayne McKeon, Emlyn Mulligan, and Ronan Gallagher, we have a good mix.”
Connacht FBD SFL Round 1
Sunday January 8
**Roscommon v IT Sligo, Boyle 2pm
Mayo v NUIG, MacHale Park, 2pm
Sligo v Galway, Enniscrone, 2pm
Leitrim v GMIT, Mohill, 2pm
