Having suffered an opening night defeat Mervue United’s League of Ireland adventure lingers on tomorrow at Jackman Park.
Mervue manager Johnny Glynn was disappointed with how the Athlone Town tie unfolded, but will be aware that his team were competitive following a nervy start. Glynn insists that Mervue must absorb the lessons from the loss. “It was the first match of 33 and I think we’ll have learned a lot from it. We can only improve. I said to the lads at half-time, ‘If we try to play worse we couldn’t have’. We did come back into it alright in the second half but then, even after that, they had a lot of chances. We have a lot to do.
“It’s an awful start for us. I think the occasion definitely got us. You try and do everything right to get that right and I suppose, as a manager, I have to take some responsibility. You throw in the national anthem, parades and all this stuff.
“We were nervous all over the pitch in the first 20 minutes. I couldn’t point a finger at the younger players, and then our more experienced lads were making basic errors and things weren’t happening for them.”
So now Mervue must make the short trip to Limerick FC, who themselves were outfoxed last Friday. A difficult pre-season for Limerick in which a manager and a couple of important players departed has had an effect, but a nice squad will be available to whoever replaces Mike Kerley.
Dave Ryan, Brian O’Callaghan, Wayne Colbert, and John Tierney are capable footballers at this level, who will expect to be able to deal with Mervue. Still Mervue proved in 2008 that producing impressive away results was within their remit, and it would be misguided to dismiss their challenge. Ryan Griffin’s excellence between the sticks, which included a penalty save, kept Mervue in contention, while the honesty of David O’Brien, Nicky Curran, Nigel Keady, and Kenny Farrell was commendable too.
After carrying out surgery during the Athlone contest Glynn may opt to tweak his starting XI a little, but they will all be subscribing to the same theory. Avoiding a second reversal is Mervue’s errand, and if that is accomplished hope will be restored.
