Bradley proud of Donaghmore’s efforts in tough conditions

By Niall Gartland

DONAGHMORE’S confidence won’t be knocked by the nature of Saturday’s Senior Championship draw against Carrickmore, according to former Derry star Paddy Bradley.

Bradley, a member of Donaghmore’s management team, watched his side relinquish a five-point lead in the dying embers of a massively entertaining last-eight clash at Pomeroy, but the important thing from his perspective is that they live to fight another day.

Placing what was, on the whole, a thoroughly-credible performance from Donaghmore in its wider context, Bradley said, “Donaghmore would’ve maybe been accused of lacking a wee bit of belly, but we showed plenty of fight today. We earned the right to be on that field and we really stood up to Carrickmore in the second half.

“As a group we have plenty of belief. There’s a narrative maybe on the outside that, because they haven’t gone deep in the championship in the last number of years, that the team lacks belief, but I can tell you from working with these boys all year, there’s plenty of belief in the group.

“We felt we were more than a match for Carrickmore. We thought we’d have won today, but there’s a second day and we’re going to take confidence from the fact we’re still in the championship.

“We know we’ve improvements to make and we will make them through the week.”

Donaghmore surged into a 1-11 to 0-5 lead at the break with the wind at their backs, but they expected the shape of the game to change in the second half. Bradley was still a bit disappointed that they couldn’t go on to finish the job, but added that he felt a draw was a fair result.

“We got off to a really good start, Carrickmore came back at us and manufactured four or five really good scores themselves… we thought we were in a decent place but we knew the breeze would have a massive impact on the second half.

“We talked about trying to get a foothold at the start of the second half and not giving away two-pointers, but the first score they got was a two-pointer. We’d be disappointed with our own conversion rate, we probably created five or six chances and dropped maybe three short, then big Fergal [Donaghy] had one there at the last to go on and win it, Conor Cush before that.

“Look, it was a very even game between two sides in difficult conditions, and probably a draw’s a fair result.

“They [Carrickmore] are a fantastic club. I’ve been watching them in championship football from afar for a long time. They have great tradition and they were always going to fight to the end, but I thought our boys battled really well.”