‘The girls showed great heart’ – McCormack happy with first camogie outing

“It’s great to be back and I know it’s only the league, but we’re delighted with the win.”

So said new Westmeath camogie manager, Darren McCormack, in O’Toole Park, Crumlin yesterday afternoon, after his troops had deservedly edged out Dublin 1-10 to 2-5 in their first competitive outing of 2021, writes Gerry Buckley.

The Westmeath women showed great resolve to come back twice from the concession of goals. The Castlepollard legend concurred, as follows: “This was only our 11th session. We came back on April 19 and the girls have worked very hard. They showed great heart there today.

“When girls work hard enough in training, whether you’re down five, six, seven points in a game with 15 minutes to go, when you’ve the work done, you can pull it out in the end.

“It’s been driven into them over the years that the game is never over until the final whistle. That’s what we are trying to drive into them as well.

“Their two goals were sucker punches, the first one just before half-time, which is a killer in any game, but we responded well, and the same with the second one. We have girls in there with lots of experience.

“Late in the game, Méadbh (Scally) caught a great ball in the square and they pulled her down, and Sheila (McGrath) put away the penalty. These are key players in key positions.”

With veterans such as the incomparable Pamela Greville having retired, it is a new era for camogie in the Lake County. The winning bainisteoir stated: “We had only one of our starting forwards for the last three years, Sheila McGrath, and we were playing her a little further out the field.

“Our backs were unreal today. Their first goal could have happened to anyone after a shot that dropped in from distance. The second goal they got was good, but overall I thought we penetrated their backline a little more. I’m disappointed that we didn’t get more scores.”

Looking ahead to a round two fixture against Meath in Kinnegad next Saturday, McCormack concluded: “They gave us a good thrashing last year in the league. We’re down a number of key players, but it’s a building process as well as everything else.

“We had 17 or 18 subs there on the line who are all new girls on the panel. It’s good experience for them as well. We started maybe six girls today who hadn’t got any Westmeath time for the last number of years.

“It’s good. It’s very positive. Meath will be a different ball game, but we’ll take every game as it comes.”