Farney fate in their own hands

By Shaun Casey

IF Monaghan can gain two victories from their final two games against Tipperary and Laois, then they’ll secure their status in Division Two and that’s the goal going forward for the Farney County, says boss Darren Greenan.

Two teams will fall from the second division this season and Monaghan currently sit second from bottom in the table but outside of Kildare and Tyrone, who are already promoted, every other team has relegation hanging over their heads.

“There’s two teams go down this year which is a substantial change because a very competitive league table and now with two teams already placed into the final, that throws an extra complication into it,” says Greenan in his first year in charge of the Monaghan ladies.

“The rest of the six teams, they can all get relegated at this point so it’s all about survival and it’s in our own hands. We have two games left and if we win the two games, we’ll stay up regardless of what happens with the other teams so that’s a nice way to be.

“We were probably a wee bit late coming to the table in terms of our managerial appointment and getting up and running and we probably made the price in those first few league games where we were competitive, but we didn’t get over the line.

“We ran Kildare to four points, and they’ve ramped up to the top of the table then we probably got caught against Westmeath and shipped a few goals in those early games when we were getting our defensive structure sorted out.

“We were very competitive in those early rounds and very happy with our performance, but the results just weren’t there for us and we’d have liked to have another few points on the board at this stage.”

Laois are currently at the bottom of the Division Two table while victory on Saturday afternoon would lift Monaghan above this weekend’s opponents Tipperary, but Greenan isn’t taking anything for granted.

While he admits that Monaghan have two very difficult games left to play in order to retain their place in Division Two, he’s happy that it’s in their own hands and they won’t be sweating on other results.

“Tipperary and Laois are both senior championship teams and Tipperary in particular have been very unfortunate, I think they’ve lost three games by one point which would have left them much higher up the table.

“At the minute they are where they are, and we need the three points on Saturday, and we’re guaranteed to stay up if we can get these six points from the last two games and if we only win one then we can still possibly stay up.

“That would mean we’re relying on what other teams are doing then and with Tyrone and Kildare already in the final, we don’t quite know what they’ll be doing in the last few games so it might not go on previous form, and we have to be careful of that.”