SAHC: Brian Murphy hails never-say-attitude of Bride Rovers

While Bride Rovers manager Brian Murphy might have feared that a six-point deficit with six minutes of normal time left was too much to overhaul, he felt that composure of his team was superb.

An unanswered 1-4 turned things around from a position where they trailed by 2-14 to 1-11 and Murphy felt that the ability of the team to swing the momentum was a major factor.

“If you are being totally honest, you are thinking too much of a mountain to come back,” he said, “but, once we settled down and tacked over one or two points and got it back to four, then you are thinking it is a manageable score.

“The goal went in and, from there on, you had momentum on your side and momentum is a massive thing in sport. Once we had momentum on our side, you are thinking, ‘Jesus, we could actually do this.’

“Castlelyons were outstanding today, but for what the lads have gone through the last two years, just different things, they were fantastic; their attitude, they never bitched or moaned about anything, they just got on with it. Fantastic attitude, never-say-die, and you saw that again today.

“To be fair to these lads, they live in each other's pockets. They are just constantly together. They are kind of all the same age cohort. They are just constantly together and it is fantastic.

“And look, you are going to make mistakes. Mistakes happened today, that is part of sport.

We probably had a hard job, not a hard job during the week, but we had 22 scoring chances last week that we didn't take between wides and shots dropping short.

“And look, there was a small bit of feeling sorry for ourselves, but in fairness to the lads they got straight back onto it again. They are getting the rewards they deserve.

“They have put in all the work. It is the club coaches from the all the way up, we are just there for the last part of it. It is the work that has been put in all the way from underage.”

Regulars in the knockout stages in the past few years, Bride Rovers have endured some disappointments but channelled them well - something Murphy also felt they did after losing to Watergrasshill in their last group match this year.

“The work being put in now at underage is fantastic,” he said.

“The population is increasing as houses are being built, so that is always a big help. But a lot of these lads, they were playing in teams when we didn't have the population. It is not just population, it is hard work.

“We went through the group stages, the loss to Watergrasshill was probably the best thing that ever happened to us. It probably helped us big time today and got the boys refocused. I won't say running ahead of ourselves, but we had two wins, good scoring difference.

“That defeat brought us back down to earth and got us going again. I can't praise the guys enough.”a