Underdogs Waterford to Test Derry

On Saturday afternoon for the first time ever in Championship football, Waterford and Derry clash in the senior level at Fraher Field in Dungarvan after the two sides were the first out of the hat in the first round of the All-Ireland qualifiers which was made recently.

On paper its hard to see all but one result in this game.

At the end of last year, the ranking for last year’s championship were published and Waterford were ranked third from bottom of the 33 counties that played for the All-Ireland Championship with only the exiles of London and New York below them and Kilkenny not included as they did not enter the Leinster Senior Football Championship.

Derry for their part were ranked in twelfth place, after they lost to Tyrone in the championship, but beat Louth, Meath and Cavan in the All-Ireland qualifiers before they lost out to Tipperary in the fourth round of the All-Ireland qualifiers.

Since then a large number of players from last year’s championship panel have left the panel and without them they have somewhat struggled.

Many would say that the Oak Leaf County should have readymade replacements for those that left the set up, or at least players that are almost up to the standard that you would expect as Derry have contested the last two Ulster Minor Final’s winning in 2015 and were runners up last year and this year they contested the Ulster Under 21 Football Final.

But as we all know success at underage level does not always mean that success will follow at adult level, but underage success is a help towards success coming your way in the higher grades.

The county has not have had the best of years to date.

They played in Division Two of the National League and were relegated at the end of the campaign as their best results came against Kildare who were promoted from Division Two and Fermanagh who like Derry were relegated to the third tier of the league ladder for 2018.

In the championship they were pitted against Tyrone for the second year in a row and against their neighbours they suffered a 0-22 to 0-11 defeat back at the end of May.

The same two counties also clashed in the McKenna Cup, the second competition for Senior Inter county football side organised each year by the Ulster County and again victory went to Tyrone on a 2-13 to 1-7 score line.

James Kiel twat suspended for Derry’s last game against Tyrone, but one swallow does not make a summer and his loss cannot be blamed for such a heavy loss, as they have some quality players in the likes of corner back Niall Keenan, centre back Chris McKaigue, Conor McAtamney in the middle of the field as well as Benny Heron, Emmet McGuckian, Enda Lynn and Mark Lynch in attack.

How much of Derry’s poor early season performances is down to the success of Slaughtneil who won both the Hurling and Football Championships in Derry last year and went on to have very good runs in the Ulster Club Championships, going on to contest the All-Ireland Club Football Final on Saint Patrick’s Day, losing out to a strong Dr Croke’s team who beat Waterford Champions The Nire in the Munster Final at Mallow.

Waterford in the early part of the year did not have the record they would have liked.

Tom McGlinchey’s side lost both of their games in the McGrath Cup and in the League, a competition that Waterford had high hopes of getting out of this year, won just two games, against London and Wicklow which did not give much hope to many heading into the championship a few weeks ago.

But the revising of the championships in Waterford this year proved beneficial to Tom McGlinchey as instead in other years playing hurling in the weeks before the Counties Munster Championship owner, two rounds of the hurling championship were played before one round of football and since then the popular Cork man has had his charges to work with uninterrupted.

In ranking the senior football for RTE last year, journalist James McMahon said that it was “Hard to see much of an upturn (in Waterford’s results), though the prospect of Cork coming to Dungarvan at the end of May, should at least focus minds on delivering a respectable performance.”

Granted, Cork in 2017 when it comes to football are not the side of yesteryear but hopefully Waterford running the Rebels to within one point at Fraher Field last month, and having chances to actually beat the rebels we will see Waterford move up the rankings in 2017. There is some that will at every opportunity will knock Waterford football, but Waterford football is not as poor as some would suggest. All it needs is to be given a fair crack of the whip.

Since taking over the Waterford Senior Football team Tom McGlinchey had extracted some committed performances from his charges, even if results have not gone their way.

Last year they caused Tipperary problems before the Premier County pulled away towards the end of the game, and travelled to Carrick-on-Shannon to play Leitrim in the qualifiers (it is almost an unwritten rule that Waterford travels for the qualifiers).

It is worth noting that in the last two season’s Tom McGlinchey has played without any of the Stradbally players, but he can still put out a strong side.

Paul Whyte is a quality footballer, Donie Breathnach and Gavin Crotty are good forwards and they could have Patrick Hurney back this weekend, while at the other end of the field, Stephen Enright, Brian Looby, Thomas O’Gorman, Tadhg Ó hUallachain, Ray Ó Ceallaigh etc. are all very good players.

One leading bookmaker is quoting Derry as 1/5 to win this game and Waterford are 9/2.

Waterford are a side that are often a side very difficult to beat at Fraher Field and those that do take 9/2 could well end up with extra money in the pocket this weekend.