"Sometimes you just need the luck"- O'Neill trying to look at the positives despite third Kildare defeat in a row

The experience of those two teams in their respective championships has reflected their efforts pumped into the league in recent years. In 2016, Roscommon focused their efforts on maintaining their Division 1 status and were eventually burnt out by the time it got around to the championship, losing a Connacht final replay to Galway in humiliating fashion before bowing out of the All-Ireland in their next game by suffering a shock loss to Clare. The following year saw the Rossies relegated from Division 1 as they looked to balance their year more evenly, and it paid dividends as they landed a Connacht title.

placeholder image — The experience of those two teams in their respective championships has reflected their efforts pumped into the league in recent years. In 2016, Roscommon focused their efforts on maintaining their Division 1 status and were eventually burnt out by the time it got around to the championship, losing a Connacht final replay to Galway in humiliating fashion before bowing out of the All-Ireland in their next game by suffering a shock loss to Clare. The following year saw the Rossies relegated from Division 1 as they looked to balance their year more evenly, and it paid dividends as they landed a Connacht title.

Déjà vu for Kildare. Twice in seven days they hosted northern opposition in Newbridge and took the battle right down to the wire, and twice they have come out on the wrong end of a one-point difference on the scoreboard.

The Lilywhites improved drastically on the performance against Monaghan seven days previous, but a strong Tyrone side managed to steal the victory at the death thanks to an absolutely stunning point from captain Mattie Donnelly in the sixth minute of time added on. It was a cruel blow after Kildare had played some magnificent football throughout, racking up 18 points against a tight Red Hands defence despite the snowy conditions in St Conleth’s Park.

Despite the positive points to pull from this display against the Ulster champions, Kildare are still winless and sit bottom of Division 1 alongside Donegal, who they meet in two weeks’ time.

Manager Cian O’Neill was understandably gutted by another defeat, but as they set into a two-week break the positives need to be looked at as much as the negatives, of which there were few.

“They put in a massive shift today – they worked their backsides off,” said O’Neill after the game.

“Even when things were going against them in the second half – did we go down by two at one stage? – in previous years that could have been four or five very quickly to be fair to them. I’m very, very proud of the lads and the work and the shift they put in today. Sometimes you just need the luck, and that’s something that hasn’t been on our side recently.”

“The things we wanted to improve upon from last week, I think we have improved upon them. We still have a little bit more to go – we conceded a goal again before half-time today. That hurt us last week and that hurt us this week again. Our shooting has improved, but we could still be a little bit more clinical.

“The graph from a performance perspective, which ultimately in the long term is the most important thing, is on an upward trend, we’re just not getting enough scores on the board. That match could have gone either way… just a couple of things went against, and some of them weren’t our fault unfortunately.”

While Kildare have no points and are now strong favourites to drop out of the top tier of league football in their first season back in Division 1, they are at least competing. The forecast opening day defeat to Dublin was hardly crushing, while the Lilywhites proved against Monaghan and Tyrone that they have enough physicality to compete with battle-hardened Division 1 sides.

O’Neill pointed out that Kildare were plying their trade in Division 3 just two years ago, so the jump to this stage and subsequent improvement must be noted.

“At the moment, we’re not getting the points, but incrementally we are performing better each week,” he said.

“That has to be a positive for us in terms of our growth as we prepare for the championship. There is positives there for sure. Two years ago, we were in Division 3 and we really worked hard to get to where we are today in Division 1. A lot of people didn’t see it happen last year, but when you get here you really want to stay here, and that’s what is hurting at the moment. To be beaten by seven, eight or 10 points you maybe could reflect and say, ‘maybe it’s a year too soon’, but we’re not. The margins are very close, they’re very fine, so we do belong here. We just need to do a little bit more to get over the line, but we’re learning every week, and that’s the key thing.”