Tones must break even in the middle ground

By Michael McMullan

BELLAGHY manager Damian Cassidy says his side have to break even with Magherafelt in the kick-out department this weekend.

Cassidy managed the Tones to their last title in 2005 and they’ll aim for a first semi-final spot since 2015.

Bellaghy beat Ballinderry in Round One before going toe to toe with Sleacht Néill.

Leading for most of the game, they were hit by a Cahal McKaigue goal and three two-pointers after infractions from not having three in a half at vital passages of the game.

Defeat forced them into a qualifier against Faughanvale with victory setting up Saturday’s showdown with Rossa.

“We know each other well enough,” Cassidy said. “They won the championship six years ago and there are a number of players left from that.

“Like ourselves, we’ve been bringing through young players. They’ve had quite a good spread and had a lot of (underage) success.

“They’ve got themselves a good coaching set-up in ‘Horse’ (Gavin Devlin) and Enda (Muldoon).”

Having watched Magherafelt’s wins over Ballinascreen and Lavey, Cassidy was impressed by their brand of football.

“Most of the teams at that level play a similar brand,” the former Derry manager added.

“More than ever, games come down to almost your kick-out or their kick-out.”

He used Kerry’s wins over Armagh and Donegal from the county season to emphasise what Magherafelt have brought.

“That’s clearly something that, if we have any ambitions of getting a breakthrough against them, I feel we were going to at least have to break even there,” he said.

On their own game, the Bellaghy boss is happy with some aspects of their play with room for improvement in others.

The fact Sleacht Néill registered six points they didn’t have to engineer themselves due to the breaches left Bellaghy at a disadvantage.

“It’s a tough game to win when you’re starting on a minus six,” Cassidy said, feeling one of them was an incorrect call.

“We certainly were in the game, even with those breaches, and then ultimately, they caught up with us.

“The breach after the goal was a monumental hammer blow. A goal’s bad enough, but to have a two-pointer to top it.

“It’s a young team; that’s the hard school of knocks and learning. There’s nobody that got anywhere just by luck.”

Cassidy, an All-Ireland winner with Derry, points to the gradual climb to success. He used the example of Glen’s All-Ireland winning crop failing to beat Foreglen in a Derry Intermediate final as they began their climb.

The learnings for younger players, in Cassidy’s experience, comes down to dealing with the crunch moments.

It’s often filed away under the narrative of not having the “experience” or “heart” for championship football.

“If you sit down and analyse a match, you can typically pinpoint a five-minute or a seven-minute period where the game was won or lost,” he said.

“It’s in that period of the game where you have to keep your nerve. What you invariably find, is that some players don’t keep their nerve and start moving away to do things themselves individually.

“That’s not something they do deliberately. They’re actually doing it because they’re thinking they need to do something to get possession.

“That’s why I talk about that period of the game where you’ve got to keep your nerve and stick to what you know.

“That’s ultimately what you were doing and got you to the position that you’re in.”