Managers View – Kevin Madden, Creggan….
“That’s a hard lesson for these young lads but they left nothing out there today.”
By Brendan McTaggart
It’s the interview everyone dreads. From a journalist perspective, you hope the manager obliges. The manager would rather be anywhere else but picking up his beaten players from the pitch. Thankfully for me, Kevin Madden is one of the nicest guys you’re every likely to meet and gave us his thoughts shortly after the final whistle on Sunday. When asked for an immediate reaction, Madden told us: “I said to the boys before they came out here today. Don’t have any regrets. Don’t look back on this game and say we didn’t give it our all. Don’t come in having left anything in the dressing room.
“In terms of effort in how we matched up to Cargin physically and in the hunger stakes, there’s no question we wanted that today. The only thing beat us, we had more scoring chances and more good scoring chances than Cargin had but at the start of the second half when the two chances presented themselves to them, they took them and we didn’t take ours.
“That’s a hard lesson for these young lads but they left nothing out there today.”
The clinical nature of how Cargin saw out the closing minutes on Sunday was hugely impressive. Remarkable game management under the incessant pressure of the chasing Creggan hordes. Like packs of hungry wolves, they hunted for possession in the hopes of creating one more chance. The chances were fleeting such was the Cargin dominance of the closing stages. Madden admitted the Erin’s Own sides experience told in the end: “I think so. Two each at half time to 0-4 to 0-2 in a very short space of time. It went to four each before Mick McCann hit that point to win the game but in between times we’ve missed maybe five, six, seven good chances with that wind.
“You can’t buy that experience. That comes from winning and losing. These boys will be back.”
His side were obviously devastated at the full time whistle but Madden told us the outlook remains bright for the Kickhams men: “They’re devastated. I think four of our starting six forwards are under the age of 20 so they are young. They’ve came through the colleges system so they are young and they will learn from this and they will get better.
“There will come a day in the near future when Creggan will win a championship and they’ll look back on this day and think we had to lose one to win one.
“I can’t say enough about the lads and about Creggan as a club. When you pull talent, culture and the right club together then success is inevitable.”
“They lost quite a number of finals and that happens. Lámh Dhearg lost six finals and came back last year and won it. That’s the way it goes sometimes but we really felt like we had the talent on the pitch to match and more scoring talent in our forward line but what we didn’t have what Cargin has and that’s big game experience.” Madden concluded by adding: “When you have a really, really tight game in the melting pot you need someone to stick that chance. That’s what Cargin had and we didn’t.”