DERRY hurler Ruairí Convery says the Oak Leaf side need to “get our house in order very, very shortly” as they prepare for a testing National League Division 2A campaign.
Tom McLean’s men began the new year with a 6-21 to 2-19 win over Donegal in their opening Conor McGurk Tournament game last Saturday. There were new faces such as Banagher brothers Gabriel and Niall Farren, youngsters Seán Francis Quinn (Swatragh), Brendan Laverty (Lavey) and Thomas Magee (Eoghan Rua), while Oisín and Darragh McCloskey and Shane Farren made welcome returns.
However, the Derry squad has endured more upheaval than they would have cared for over the winter. They headed into the Donegal game without 16 of the squad who took them to a first ever Christy Ring Cup final last May.
While Seán McGuigan, who has moved to Spain, and Aaron Kelly are not expected to return, there are still hopes others will. But their absence over the first six weeks of training and that of the Eoghan Rua contingent, who are preparing for an All-Ireland Junior Club Championship semi-final, has made life difficult, despite the impression new coaches Brendan Lawlor and Chris McAuley have made.
And with an Antrim side hungry to banish last year’s ills under new boss PJ O’Mullan to come in their league opener on February 13, Convery concedes Derry’s preparations must improve: “Six weeks and Antrim have a big push on," he said.
"They’re a strong side and have a lot of their better players back in, a new management in place, so we know it’s going to be tough. We need to get our house in order very, very shortly,” added the experienced Swatragh man.
“At the weekend, there were 23 available for the Donegal game, a few boys away and a few injuries. If we have everybody that’s made themselves available, you’re looking in around 30. You need to be training with 30. You need to be playing as many games as possible in training and you can’t do that with 15 or 16 men. You need your 30 men out.”
Former Kildare boss Lawlor has come in to replace Dinny Cahill, while Ballycastle native McAuley has been added after Seán McGuckin departed to take the county’s senior camogie team.
Tipperary native Lawlor, who now lives in Dublin, won a Christy Ring Cup with the Lilywhites, as well as promotion back to Division 2A. With Cahill departing to join the Limerick setup, Convery felt that replacing those backroom figures was crucial to Derry’s hopes of success this year.
”Dinny was brilliant. He seemed to get the best out of a lot of boys last year. He’s a massive loss to us," he said.
“But Brian Lawlor has come in and he’s a good coach. Training so far has been top class. We definitely needed somebody else in. I know Tom worked hard at getting another coach in.
“Brian comes up at the weekend, we’ve a match on the Saturday and then he trains us on the Sunday. During the week, Chris McAuley, Bamba, takes the training. It’s been top class, it’s just a pity we couldn’t get a few more numbers to them.”
After the comfortable win over Donegal last weekend, in which Convery hit 2-6 and Jonathan O’Dwyer also impressed with 0-5, Derry continue their pre-season preparations against Monaghan this weekend.
Division 2A has seldom looked tougher, with Antrim relegated and Carlow and Westmeath still there. All three have played Liam McCarthy Cup in recent years, which is another reason Convery feels the need for things to fall into place soon.
“There’s a couple of games we’re targeting. There’s no reason we can’t give Antrim a lash. We just need everybody out falling in line," he added.
”I think, after the first three games last year, we had two wins and a draw. That meant we could start to work towards Christy Ring. But if we’re going chasing points in the last couple of games this year, we could find ourselves in a relegation battle and having a poor run in the Christy Ring, which is something we definitely don’t want to do.
“We have Roscommon in the Christy Ring, it’s as favourable a draw as we could have hoped for but, first and foremost, we’ll try to retain our league position.”
