Murphy bursting with pride after brilliant away win

It was the thoughts of days like this that persuaded Joe Murphy to swap chasing Kildare and Leinster titles with Naas and come home to lead his native county.

The smile on his face after the final whistle in Brewster Park told it’s own story.

“I'm a fierce proud Carlow man. If I can add anything to the development of Carlow football, I'm very honured to do that. To stand with these guys today and see them get a really good win in a tough environment, I'm very proud at the moment,” said Murphy.

The modern game is about many different facets but the bedrock of any good team is togetherness and hard work and Carlow showed it in abundance.

“We came together today. We’ve been working fierce hard the last four weeks and we saw the dividends of that today but we’re far from the finished article. We’ve still a lot to improve on but you would have to be happy today as a Carlow man.

“They battled for each other. There was a period there in the second half when we were under the cosh a bit but the heads didn’t drop. That’s one thing that’s very important to me because maybe in the past Carlow teams maybe lose faith in what they are doing and lose confidence. Today we showed that we can take and come back stronger and I think we finished stronger in the end,” said Murphy.

This wasn’t a win that was ground out while trying to contain the home team, it was done with style and panache and on the front foot.

“There’s a big difference between coming to win and coming not to lose, and our mentality coming up here was that we were coming to win and to meet the challenge head on and see exactly where we are,” said Murphy.

There was a special mention for some of the heroes on the day. Some might say it was a stroke of managerial genius to move Mikey Bambrick from the backline to wing forward and be rewarded with a tally of 2-4 but Murphy put the praise back on the player.

“My father always said its always better be a lucky general than a good general. Mikey speaks for himself, you could play him in any position on the field. He’s our captain, he’s our leader and just displayed that today in a mammoth performance,” he said.

Conor Doyle kicked two huge two pointers in the final quarter.

“It takes real courage to take those kicks in those situation as Conor did. They were two massive kicks for us and settled everything down again and gave us that platform to go on and get the win,” said Murphy.

He was able to call on the experience of Darragh Foley once again, who came out of retirement to link up with the squad after the Leinster Championship defeat to Meath.

“It’s massive because we are a relatively young team, guys that haven't experienced the days that Darragh has. He’s just another leader in the dressing room and the more leaders you have in a tight game like this probably help get you over the line,” said Murphy.

There was youth on display too.

“They were all thrown into the thick of it and they didn’t let anybody down. If you’re good enough you’re old enough and they certainly proved today that they are good enough,” said Murphy.

The squad will get stronger too. Johnny Furey and Aaron Amond travelled with the squad but didn’t tog out and Murphy said they are working hard to make themselves available again.

“Our physio is working really hard and they’ll have every opportunity and that will just add to our numbers and the depth of our panel. Everybody is important, we leave nobody behind. We’ll dust ourselves down, we’ll be back in the field on Tuesday and we’ll do a tally and see where we are then. The spirits are good but the bodies are sore after today,” said Murphy.

The team would have travelled home on a high and Murphy was keen to let them enjoy that winning feeling but attention will quickly turn to the challenge that Wexford will pose at the weekend.

“That's a massive focus,” said Murphy.

“We’ll enjoy this evening, it’s pointless having results like today if you can't enjoy them, but then the focus will shift straight after that. Wexford got promoted out of Division 4 and bet Carlow well in the Championship last year. That’s a big turnaround for us to battle against. Hopefully we can get more Carlow people out to give us a shout because it does make all the difference and we want to take advantage of it when we have our home tie,” he added.