'Matching Drumlane's work-rate is key' - Finnegan

Ladies football

Kevin Óg Carney

This Saturday’s county Ladies SFC final at Kingspan Breffni (4pm) has a draw stamped all over it; or at least that's the consensus among aficionados of the game in Cavan.

Both former winners Lacken Celtic and senior final debutants Drumlane have their backers among the neutrals but the smart money appears to be on deadlock being the name of the game at the final whistle.

And yet, Drumlane had a good bit to spare the last time they met Lacken Celtic. The two teams clashed in the final group game of the current SFC when topping the group was the sole prize on offer. On Saturday next, both teams will be looking to be on top of the whole pile with victory in the championship decider.

In what promises to be one of the most intriguing county senior ladies’ football finals for quite some time, the jury is out among pundits not only on the question of who is going to win but also on who is the pre-match favourites.

Of course, both finalists are wont to place the mantle of favourites directly in the opposite camp and while Lacken Celtic team-manager Sean Finnegan opts out of doing the expected, he does do a cracking job of talking up Drumlane:

“Drumlane were very competitive, very determined in our last group game and we were well beaten,” the long-time Gaelic football mentor told the Anglo-Celt.

“They’re a very good team and we’ll have to be at our very best to beat them and we’ll have to work really hard to match their work rate.

“They have a lot going for themselves. Their forwards are really good at taking their scores and they’ve a lot of energy in every sector of their team.”

Finnegan is optimistic that things will go well for his side this weekend. He was “very happy” with the “exceptional” work rate Lacken showed in beating Lurgan in the semi-final and “if we bring that same sort of intensity to the final, we’ll not be that far away.”

In conjunction with his backroom team of Ollie Brady and James Moynagh, the dyed-in-the-wool Celt hopes to have every box ticked in advance of his charges running out onto the hallowed turf this Saturday afternoon.

Finnegan knows though that when the sky blues run out onto Breffni in a few days time, it’ll be all up to the players and their ability to win what he describes as a “50/50 game”.

And what might make the difference on the day?

“I don’t think too many teams win championship titles without a bit of luck, without getting the rub of the green at important times.

“But we have to limit our mistakes and stop giving away possession because Drumlane will make us pay for any sloppiness on the ball.”

And what of Lacken’s supposed superiority in terms of their more decorated history and their experience?

“We’ve been there in 2020 and 2014 but we’ve a lot of young players now on the panel who’ll be asked to step up to the plate for this year’s final and that will be crucial too to the outcome in my estimation.”

The Lacken manager took a lot of satisfaction from the way his charges reacted to going behind to Lurgan last time and he’ll be looking for more of the same sort of strong mentality this weekend.

“We looked fairly good in the first half but I thought we saw the girls at their best when Lurgan went ahead in what was a very intense game of football.

“The final represents another big, big challenge for our girls but the hunger is there and they know how hard they’ve worked to get to this stage of the championship. It’ll take a very good performance to stop them achieving what I think they deserve to achieve.”