IT’S the hope that kills you.
Damian Cassidy was a spectator in Armagh on Saturday evening as Crossmaglen edged out Coalisland, and he couldn’t help but feel his Cargin side had potentially left something special behind them in Belfast yesterday.
They looked gone at ten points down to Gaoth Dobhair as they headed in at half-time, but the Antrim champions dominated the second half to bring the gap down to two at one stage, with the Donegal champions finally easing their nerves with a Michael Carroll goal.
That saw the hotly-fancied Donegal side through by 3-11 to 1-13 in the end, and Cargin boss Cassidy was left to rue an insipid second quarter in which they were cut open at will.
“It feels like regret. Whenever you see the opposition we played and the way we played in the second half, we were a superior team in the second half, what else can it leave you with only regrets?
“I was at the Cross-Coalisland game last night, absolutely nothing to be scared of whatsoever, and that’s the bit that really gets under the skin, that you know there’s potentially something more there.
“The players have got decisions to make. Do they want to come back to this level next year? In truth, you’re looking at a couple of championship matches to win to get back into this arena.
“They’ve got decisions to make about whether they want to do that or not. That’s a conversation that we’ll have. I’d like to think that when they look back and have those regrets over the winter time, that it festers sufficiently to make them think ‘this is not the way I want this to finish’,” said the Bellaghy native.
His counterpart Mervyn O’Donnell, naturally, wasn’t quite so despondent. Scoring just 1-1 in the second half, compared to 2-10 in the first, was a huge contrast but given what they’d lost, there was justification in just being happy to win.
Kieran Gillespie, whose career has been riddled with injury, was stretchered off after suffering a serious knee injury when he landed awkwardly at the throw-in.
O’Donnell was hopeful, however, that Odhrán MacNiallais and Odhrán McFadden-Ferry will both be available for their meeting with Crossmaglen in two weeks after missing yesterday’s game.
“We weren’t happy with the second half. We did speak about it in the dressing room. We expected them to have a purple patch and it was how we were going to handle that.
“I think in fairness we did get to grips with it again and got the win, that’s the main thing,” said the Gaoth Dobhair boss.
