"It’s a results business and it’s all on next week" - Maher looks ahead to Kerry trip

Willie Maher’s tenure as Laois manager has not been easy thus far. After a tough league campaign that saw them relegated to Division 2, qualification from Joe McDonagh Cup was always going to be a tough challenge for the Tipperary native.

Despite defeats to Offaly and a draw away to Carlow, Maher’s troops remain alive in this competition thanks to a win over Kildare at home on Saturday. While he seemed relatively pleased with his team’s performance here, Maher acknowledged that Kildare also weren’t at full strength.

“After last week and the disappointment of ultimately drawing the match, to win today was the objective to give ourselves an opportunity to go at Kerry next week and see what happens.

“Job done today. There’s a lot of positives, just to put everything into context, Kildare were down three or four there, I think they’re probably getting ready for next week and their relegation battle against Down.”

While it may be true that Kildare didn’t have their full hand to play with, Laois’ defence did very well to hold them to just eleven scores.

“We scored 1-20 plus, Kildare scored 11 so that’s a positive any day. A lot of lads showed up and played well for us. They worked very hard in the first half, it was very difficult with the monsoon-like conditions.

“It was very difficult to hurl into that wind but lads manfully stuck to the task and our spirit is good. That’s the consistency that we have all year, our spirit has carried us through to this point and look we’re getting ready for Kerry now.”

When weather conditions started to get a bit better in Portlaoise, Maher’s men picked up the pace of their play and picked Kildare off eventually.

“Lads stood up and the scoreboard kept ticking, I suppose that was the message to the guys to keep going at what we’re doing and keep the scoreboard ticking.

“I think in the first half we had a 58% efficiency, which wasn’t good enough, our shots were poor at times but we did keep scoring which was the pleasant thing.”

Standouts for Laois on the day included Fiachra C Fennell, Tomas Keyes and Stephen Maher. It was the performance of the Laois midfield duo of Ross King and Aidan Corby that proved crucial though, as Maher praised the pair’s work rate.

“Roddy’s a really good hurler and he has really good hands, he’s done it with Rathdowney-Errill and he’s done it with Laois over a period of time. He works very hard. He was kind of struggling for fitness at the start of the year and had a few niggly injuries.

“Aidan (Corby) is going really well. A really honest player and he’s getting his go this year and he’s taken it so we’re happy with both of them.”

Maher feels his team are improving as they head for the penultimate match away in Kerry next week where a result will be necessary again.

“A big positive for us is that we’re getting a bit fitter as the year goes on which is great, we’re getting more top class hurling and training which is showing. But again, it’s a results business and it’s all on next week so we’ll see how we go.”