All eyes on Laois as Donnelly parks Leitrim saga

By Jonathan Hogan

FERMANAGH manager Kieran Donnelly says any disruption caused by Leitrim’s weekend concession has been “parked,” with full focus now on Laois and their must-win clash at Brewster Park this Sunday.

The Erne men were awarded two points after Leitrim’s shock withdrawal from their scheduled Division Three fixture in Ballinamore, a move that sparked debate within the GAA. But Donnelly insists there’s no time to dwell on what was out of their control.

“You just move on with it; it’s something you can’t control,” he said. “We just trained Sunday morning and had a really good session. That’s all we focused on — making sure it was a good session because it’s often hard to replicate a game. But we felt we trained well. There wasn’t much talk about it; we parked it and moved on. We knew we had Laois this weekend and then championship just around the corner.”

The equation is simple: Fermanagh need a win — and a bit of luck. If Antrim also beat Kildare and Offaly take down Clare, they could yet leapfrog both teams to clinch promotion.

“We’re still in with a chance, albeit relying on other results to go our way,” Donnelly acknowledged. “But we do feel we have played well throughout the league. The first game was probably our only blip; besides that, our performance levels have been high. The game we lost — the Clare game — we felt we were seriously unlucky that day.

“It’s been a positive league. A lot of players have come in and really added to the squad. We’ve had to deal with injuries, so it’s a testament to the team and squad that we’ve had such positive performances and results.”

With th Leitrim saga in the rearview, Donnelly is determined his players move on quickly, knowing their last outing — a dramatic late draw with Sligo — proves they can grind out a result when needed.

“Laois have been going well in terms of they’ve been on an upward trajectory this past two years under Justin McNulty,” he noted. “They’ve had good performances and good results against the likes of Sligo and Antrim.

“We feel it’s a good game to have, especially our last game leading into the championship, whether it takes us to promotion or just preps us for the Down game. They’re a physical team that traditionally like to kick the ball; they’re notorious for their inside-forwards, so we expect a physical and direct game from them. There’s no doubt they’ve been racking up big scores, so they’re very much a team to be wary of.”

Donnelly also highlighted the importance of home support at Brewster Park.

“Crowds have been good, and especially in those games against Antrim and Offaly where we played really well, the crowd has been brilliant and created a nice atmosphere. Then at the end of that Sligo game, we felt that the crowd really got behind us,” he said.

“The new rules have added to it; I think there’s been a lot of good football played due to the tweaks, and a lot of big scores — especially the two-pointers against Sligo — and that’s good to give the crowd something to shout about.”

As for team news, Donnelly confirmed no major changes to the squad, with Luke Flanagan back in the fold for Sunday’s clash.

Fermanagh’s promotion fate may be somewhat out of their hands, but a win over Laois would give the Brewster Park crowd plenty more to shout about and send them into the championship on a high.