Dundalk FC :: News

22 March 2008: “It’s a difficult place to come to, and when you come down here and get three points, it’s very satisfying.” - Gill

Dundalk manager John Gill saw his side soar to the summit of the eircom League of Ireland First Division thanks to a 2-1 defeat of Longford Town at Flancare Park on Saturday night. And, afterwards, the boss admitted his happiness with the three points. “I’m very, very pleased with the win,” Gill told dundalkfc.com. “It’s a difficult place to come to, and when you come down here and get three points, it’s very satisfying.

“We haven’t had the best of records away from home recently, so that’s a pleasing aspect too. The system Longford played was very hard to play against; they played a very defence-minded shape with five in the middle. It’s difficult to play against that; they’re the home team and the onus should be maybe on them to attack. But we were patient, and I thought we defended very well in the first-half.

“We had a little chat at half-time and said we needed to up the work-rate a little bit, and not to be as sloppy with our passing, and I thought we did that. Substitutions sometimes work for you, sometimes they don’t - but tonight, they worked. Trevor Vaughan came on and made the first goal, and it was a fantastic finish for the second one. I thought both of our goals were very, very good finishes.

“Again, we can’t seem to get any continuity in the side. I would have liked to keep a clean-sheet tonight, but it’s great that defensively we’ve been okay, because we haven’t had the same back four in the last three games. I thought young Ian Ryan acquitted himself brilliantly at right-back - he’s a tremendous young player for twenty years of age. Shane Grimes, 21, the same. It’s a youngish side. I thought Paul Crowley also done very well when he came on, after we were unlucky to lose David Cassidy before half-time with a hamstring strain.

“We were very professional, I thought. We did what we had to do in the second-half, we upped the tempo. I think we’re a good side. We’re not the finished article; we’re still a work-in-progress. It’s still very early - there are no trophies given out at this time of the year - but it’s nice that we’ve gone away to Shels and we’ve gone away to Longford - two of the teams fancied in this division - and we’ve taken four out of six points. You can’t be too unhappy with that.”

One of the main decisions which Gill had to make for the trip to the midlands was who to give the number one shirt to. In the end, he chose regular netminder Chris Bennion, and the Scot repaid the manager’s faith with an excellent performance. “He pulled off one great save in the first-half when they got through one-on-one, and overall, his handling was superb,” Gill observed. “People will say that Aaron Shanahan has done nothing wrong, but neither has Chris. I have great faith in Chris Bennion; he’s a top class goalkeeper - a Premier Division one, I think. He’s only let me down once, down in Cobh, but this is my third year here, and Chris is a tremendous professional. He’s very honest, as is Aaron Shanahan, so we’re lucky - I always like to carry two quality ‘keepers, and I think that we have that.”

Dundalk’s win brought their points total to seven from the opening three games, and Gill feels that his team will be hard to beat in the coming months. “I think this team works very, very hard, they’re very, very focussed, there’s a great will to win, and we’re going to be hard to beat. Whether or not that’s good enough to go on and win it, I don’t know, but we’ll be there or thereabouts. I think there’s a toss of a coin between every club in this division. Last night’s results say it all. But I’m very happy with the group of players that I have. They’re a great bunch to be with; they’re very honest, and they’re low maintenance. Last year, we probably had too many high maintenance players - I made a conscious decision to rectify that and I’ve done that with the players that I’ve brought in.”