So the lottery of the youth intake comes around again and we've done pretty well out of it. Not Michael Devine well but well enough to add some quality for years to come. I expect the five of Kelly, Smith, Connaughton, Murphy and Cooney to play some part in the first team in the next few years. It'll get to the point in the future where I'll be lucky if I get one player to keep so I need to enjoy these while they last!
The messiah wont be pulling the strings in midfield for almost the remainder of the season. If we avoid relegation playoff he's probably played his last game for us again.
A dreadful month for us sees the only positive being a solitary point against Dundalk at home. It looked like we were putting together a half decent season after the last few months but this has brought us right back to where we were: a relegation battle.
So with two games to go we are five points ahead of Longford who have a game in hand. They were almost dead and buried a month or so ago but two wins out of three coinciding with Bray Wanderers four straight losses has seen Bray Wanderers now all but automatically relegated. If Longford win their game in hand it will be interesting as we play them first up next month. Fran O'Connell continues in third on the goalscoring charts.
Longford play their catch up game to start the month and get a surprise win away to Bohemians leaving them two points behind with two games each to play and the showdown against us up next....
....A really poor result when there was so much riding on it. We never really looked up for this game and credit to Longford they played like they had been the last month or so, like a team full of confidence and on a roll. That result put them one point ahead of us with a single game remaining. Our fate was now out of our hands as Longford played Drogheda Utd away and we played Cork City at home, who we'd only drawn with twice this season.
The Final Day
Welcome to Sky Sports coverage of the final day of the Irish Premier League season where two games in particular are catching the imaginations of supporters up and down the country. We'll keep you updated with all the highlights from a Frantic Friday. Stay tuned for the respective kick offs.
13' GOAL ALERT - Shaun Kelly slips in Jake Keegan to place a shot across the keeper and make it 1-0 to Salthill.
26' GOAL ALERT - Cowan beats a couple on the right and floats a cross to the back post where Duffy meets it with his head to put Longford one up.
30' GOAL ALERT - Foley plays it into the six yard box from the right and Fewster taps it home from a couple of yards to level it up for Drogheda Utd.
Half Time
Right now as it stands Salthill Devon are one point ahead of Longford with 45 minutes remaining. There's all to play for as both teams look to avoid relegation. Stay tuned for more action!
Second Half
56' GOAL ALERT - Keegan turns provider as O'Connell goes one on one and slips it past the oncoming Keeper, 2-0.
73' RED CARD - Controversy here as Longford midfielder Denis Moran is shown a second yellow card for tripping McFaul. Longford have it all to do now with 10 men.
74' GOAL ALERT - Nervy finish now as Cork City work an overlap on the left hand side and Dennehy powers a left footed strike past Walsh's near post from a tight angle. 2-1.
82' GOAL ALERT - Fewster at the double as he beats the keeper at the second attempt. Longford now with a mountain to climb, 2-1 and a man down while Salthill enjoy a 2-1 advantage over Cork City with 10 mins remaining.
83' A big cheer goes around The Drom in Galway as news of Drogheda taking the lead means that Salthill only need a point to stay up due to their superior goal difference.
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Final Whistle sounds and the Salthill manager and players celebrate a hard earned victory with news flooding through that Longford were unable to get a goal back. Full credit to Dan Roper for proving us the media wrong and keeping this small club from Galway in the Premier League for another season.
View attachment 366465 It's very quiet scenes here for Longford will have to face up to the lottery of the relegation playoff. Last season Limerick FC weren't able to pick themselves up for it and Salthill came through with an impressive result Longford will be hoping that history doesn't repeat itself. Back to you in the studio.
Three years running we've beaten our record high. No surprises we did it this year as it's our first IPD season. Hopefully we can build on this in years to come.
Confirmation of the final places as we finish two points and ten goals out of relegation. Surprisingly we only finished one point behind Shamrock Rovers with a far superior goal difference. This is quite worrying for them as they were back to back winners only four years ago.
Fran O'Connell finishes third here with 15 goals in 21 games which is remarkable for a 17 year old who was initially touted as second fiddle to Michael Devine. If only we had of kept hold of him....
Once again a good core of 7 players who started 20+ games and then as you can see a few of the new signings playing about half a season due to them coming in July. Was fairly settled by the end of it but know that improvement in not only my current players but in new additions is crucial to kick on.
Jason Molloy Salthill Devon FC's Fans Player of the Year
A gem of a signing on a free transfer. Always popped up with an assist or goal when needed. One of our top three or four players. Needs to consolidate and not be a one hit wonder like Bolger last season.
Trouble in that left back slot as I mentioned earlier in the season with Coll being injured our only other feasible option was Mernagh who was a last minute desperation signing to cover Coll and won't be consistently up for this level. Would have loved to have him the last couple of years though as his versatility allowed hiim to play anywhere along the back four.
Our first Republic of Ireland international call up at any level. Very exciting that it's another home grown academy product following in the footsteps of Arbuthnot's NI U19 call up. Who will be next?
Big losses for such a small club. IPD football is hurting but we all know that a little bit of short term hurt will result in some long term gain hopefully.
I doubt I'll be using that transfer budget this year so that'll pretty much double my wage budget for next season allowing me to bring in more quality players to push on and hopefully finish higher than 10th.
Only the one permanent out this winter as experienced GK Ciaran Kelly is released following a horrible start by him last season. Walshy came straight in after a few games and played admirably for the rest of the season. I did release Aidan McLaughlin our top striker from a couple of seasons ago as his performances didn't warrant an upgrade to a semi pro contract.
As for the ins Daire Daly is a young striker with a shed load of potential. So is 19 year old GK Joey Fallon who has the talent to go straight into the first team. He spent last season on loan at Athlone Town from Shelbourne and played remarkably well for a lad in a newly promoted side. The rest are all first team quality and give us tremendous depth in all positions now.
So we start with Athlone Town and finish with Shelbourne. That last game may prove crucial if we struggle again next season as they are expected to be down there too.
The season starts a week early so we get two games in February instead of the usual one. It doesn't help us get off to a better start as a pair of one nil losses open our account. We were far to careless in the loss to Fanad Utd in the league cup as there was nothing I could say to motivate them. A good run in the cups will be important for income this season so it's disappointing to miss out on this one. If I have a good league season then that'll make up for it.
League Standings/Player Stats
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We cant afford to have a bad start to this season and be forced to play catch up so the players will need to find their feet quick smart. I realise there are a lot of new players so hopefully they can gel a bit quicker.
So Joey Fallon makes it three international call ups for the club. Granted he was a transfer in but his early season performances have warranted a call up.
Well this was unexpected! After the Athlone Town loss I was expecting another tough hard slog of a season. To the credit of the players they turned things around and got some excellent results against some very good teams. The big result and probably our best ever result as a club was the 3-0 away win over reigning champions Sligo Rovers.
No. The answer is no. Just no. I asked last month if we dare to dream and this month emphatically answers that question. ****. After such a good month we get over confident or something and the **** falls out of the team. Night and Day. Just shows that we are no where near where it looked like we were this time last month. A false dawn.
Nzuzi is a loss at RB as he had a good start to the season and looked to be growing into that role. Youngster Kelly was getting little bits and pieces in the first team so to have him sit out injured can only be a bad thing for his progress.
A mixed bag of a month with two wins and two losses in the league and an early knock out in the second round of the Challenge Cup. I bring your attention to the 5-4 loss to Limerick. This game brought about a change in formation to a 4-2-3-1 with two DM's and two narrow AM's. We were down 5-0 after an hour then youngster Daire Daly who earlier missed a sitter at nil all woke up and terrorised the Limerick with four goals in 25 minutes to put a fright in the LImerick corner. As appalled as I am at the defending we may have unearthed a gem of a player here.
We righted the ship a bit this month and climb out of the relegation zone but it's so tight in the middle of the table I expect a lot of fluctuation in the coming months so it's important for me not to get carried away with monthly league positions.
Very secure....I like the sound of that. The dressing room is a great place to be at the moment. The players are getting along and enjoying their football. Hopefully it lasts.
Young LB Alan Kehoe wins the award in our only league game of the month. Happy with how he's going and will hopefully improve more this season. At the moment he's is keeping out the more experienced pair of Lorcan Fitzgerald and Ciaran Coll.
Only one league game this month, a win over Sligo Rovers. As I mentioned last month I've changed formations so it was important to get plenty of friendly games in our month long break so that the players could hit the ground running.
Mid table at the halfway point of the season isn't too shabby at all.On a sad note out commanding CB Stephen Folan had decided not too extend his expiring contract and has left to Skrill Premiership side Chester for 18K. He leaves a hole in the defence that hopefully can be filled by our others for the rest of the season.
The board is still happy and we are still leaking money. Even though our results have improved from last year we're not seeing this in terms of bums on seats with out average attendance down on our previous seasons.
So our curse with injuries continues this month, twisted ankles and knees seem to have been a continuing pattern since I've been here. It's probably due to our average training facilities so I can't see an end to it anytime soon as our lack of money is hindering any chance the club has of improving facilities.
Attacking Midfield/Striker Enda Curran joins us on a free along with back up keeper Greg Murray and young centre half Karl Chambers. Leaving us were Folan as I mentioned along with Gareth Cambridge to Hereford on a free and youngster Seamus Murphy, on loan to Finn Harps.
Another topsy turvy month with three wins and three losses which typifies our season to date. Jason Molloy having a very good month chipping in with four goals.
So we stay in 7th, nine points out of the relegation playoff position. We have started beating the teams below us more frequently so I'm feeling more confident of staying up this year and not getting dragged into a relegation dog fight.
We finish this month with the result of the Euro 2016 final played at the Stade de France which Italy took out on penalties against surprise packets Serbia for who Dusan Tadic missed the all important spot kick. Italy have now won back to back World and Euro cups.
This is my first personal award at the Premier League level and it's a sign of the progress we're making as a team from week to week/month to month/year to year.
So four league games this month and undefeated! Wins against 3rd place Athlone Town and 6th Place Cork City to go with draws against 5th place Derry City and league leaders Sligo Rovers are very impressive for our humble little club. Who would have though that three and a half years after taking over we would be getting these results? I sure didn't when we were fighting off 10th place in the First Division.
Sheehan picked up three goals for us in a rare good month for him.
Even though we had a good month nothing has changed much for us in the league. We're still in 7th still nine points ahead of the relegation playoff spot.
Another good month in the league sees the Board continue to be happy with how things are going, aside from the wages spent. There's a strong possibility that a number of more experienced, higher payed players will depart this off season and give a chance to some younger guys to ease the pressure on the clubs finances. Hopefully it won't see a drop in the clubs fortunes on the pitch.
An excellent youth intake again with potentially 4 or 5 first team prospects. This is what has encouraged the idea to give some youngsters a go. Below are some screenshots of the best of them.
Another quality striker to come through the ranks. Other clubs are already circling and with him stalling on signing a new contract I can see a repeat of the Michael Devine situation.
Will need to be trained up to play either AMC or STC as I don't currently play with wide midfielders. If he is that good in a few years though there might be a change of tactics.
We now have four players playing under age international football for Ireland. Two of them have been produced by our youth academy with is a great sign for the future. Hopefully in years to come one of them can make the step up to the senior squad.
A win, two draws and a loss guarantee's another season of top flight football for Salthill Devon. There are signs we are improving and with players like young striker Daire Daly maturing rapidly due to high exposure to first team football the future looks bright.
With two games to go we could still drop to 8th place or climb as high as 5th. If nothing changed I would be very happy with 7th place after last years dramatic finish.
Probably the best time of the year for this to happen as the season is all but over and I'm not looking to make any changes to the squad for at least a month or so.
It's frustrating enough the amount of injuries we get at the club let alone when they go out on international duty. I would never stop a player representing their country but a club with as few top players as we have can't afford to have them sitting out crucial matches at no fault of our own.
Only two competitive games this month as we lose both of them to Dundalk and Shelbourne. The Dundalk game was especially frustrating as I felt we were making progress against them after our earlier draw but our last two results of 3-1 and 4-1 show we are a way away from matching it with the big boys on a consistent level.
So nothing changed from last month again as we hold onto 7th spot with Bohemians unable to catch us. Sligo Rovers were champions for the fourth time in five years. Will anyone match the juggernaut? It doesn't appear likely.
Four years in a row we have better our previous years league standing, this time beating it by three places. Hopefully this means we have consolidated our place in the IPD and can now look to lower the wage budget a bit and push on with younger players.
That equates to about one month's losses. As you can see we will need European football in the next three or four years or risk going into administration. It's no where near as bad as that now but unless we dramatically slash the wage budget or sell off all our promising youngsters it will continue to decline steadily.
It was getting a bit worrying as the old board weren't willing to extend my contract all season. I was thinking there was a chance I would be let go and this story was coming to an end! Thankfully the new chairman made it his first point of business to offer me a three year deal that keeps me secure in the knowledge I have some time to help this club grow.
Predictions all over the place this year as we finish three spots higher, 10th place St Pat's were predicted for 4th and 9th placed Shelbourne were mean't to finish bottom comfortably. Where will they think we finish next year?
Young keeper Joey Fallon picks up a close third place in this years award. His first season for us has been outstanding and with him only being 18 we won't see the best of him for at least another 10 years.
Emerging centre back Patrick Seery gets 5 PoM awards to come in equal second in the league. He is unstoppable in the air and cuts out countless long balls. Midfield enforcer Darren Murphy comes runner up in yellow cards with 12 in 25 league games.
I wanted to highlight how well our defence played this year finishing 5th in goals conceded. After last year's 10th place finish we scored 41 and conceded 54. This year we scored the same amount but only conceded 42, finishing 7th. You can see that it was our defence that lead us up the table in no small part to the roles Joey Fallon and Patrick Seery played. If we can get both offence and defence to shine at the same time we will climb again next season.
Joey Fallon leading the way playing all the games and pretty even contribution from six or seven others. I would love to get to the point where there are eight or nine guys all playing at least 25+ games a season consistently.
Joey Fallon Salthill Devon FC's Fans Player of the Year
Interesting that they chose to show my team in that formation as I never once played that all year. Fallon and Seery have been mentioned but last years fans player of the year Jason Molloy had another good year.
I bit of a jump from last year allows me a bit more room to move. I will need to move on some dead weight first before increasing the numbers in the squad.
With our increased wage budget and the fact I released more than ten contracted player this year the board are happy that I'm spending no where near the budget.
We made a small profit this month but not for reasons I'm happy with. More too follow down the page. I've bought the team back for pre season two weeks earlier than usual for a six week program to help get them sharp for the start of the season.
26.00 to win the league? It's an improvement from last season but not very realistic. With the team shaping up nicely at the start of pre season I might be inclined to put a few quid on that. Having said that I have been known to make stupid bets but I always back my boys to win.
We gain the two we lost last season but still no major improvement like I was hoping now we are fast becoming an established Premier League side with no other sides at this level in the Galway area.
As you can see 14 first team players leave freeing up a sizable chunk of the wage budget. The only one I was unhappy about was young Danny Brick who wouldn't sign on for us and instead jumped ship to Dundee Utd for ?66K. Not many ins considering how many I lost but it was about giving younger players a go and just rounding off the squad a bit. Mason and Doolin are young versatile defenders/midfielders while Flynn is an experienced DC/DMC and Danny Murphy is a 34 year old LB who was released by Cork City. His stats are still very good but I'm not expecting miracles from him. His main role will be to tutor Alan Kehoe our promising LB who isn't quite up to the mark yet.
So we start the season off against Dundalk away. After our last two poor results against them I'm itching for the team to turn up for this game. Along with Sligo Rovers I see them as the barometer to which I track our progress.
My word! After a long pre season and plenty of friendlies my goal to have them start the season on the front foot has seen us blow away last years runner up Dundalk 4-0 away from home! We got off to a flyer scoring all four goals inside 35 minutes. An excellent start but it's just that. We need to keep pushing.
So we sit top! Maybe for the only time this season so I'm going to cherish it. Daly and O'Connell were outstanding and new signing Danny Murphy had an awesome debut after much deliberation as to whether I started him or Kehoe at LB. Seems I made the right decision.
The fans are delighted still with our win over Dundalk last month and I've kept our wage budget real low but we are still leaking almost double to what we were last season.
Starting to wonder if this kid is a bit injury prone. He's had eight injuries in less than two and a half years for a total of 21 weeks injured. Our coaches have no concern over him but I'm starting to.
A five star performance in the League Cup proceeded three league wins and two draws leaving us undefeated after six games. We have now comfortably beaten the top three sides from last year by a combined score of 12-2. The two games we drew were the one's we would have been expected to win against lower sides.
Three points and a healthy goal difference clear of Sligo Rovers in second. We need to keep going and not get too downhearted when we do finally start to slump and come back to earth. Hopefully we can limit the damage when it happens. Daly and O'Connell have been outstanding so far.
Veteran Murphy scores a spectacular free kick to finish in third this month. He has been an excellent addition to the team and has added another dimension. He is the first LB that I've had that has played consistent good football.
Four wins and a draw this month sees the juggernaut roll on. 5-1 over Shamrock Rovers was undoubtedly a highlight. Murphy and Molloy had excellent months.
Eight wins and three draws from eleven games and a goal difference of +22 puts us five points ahead of Sligo Rovers with a third of the season complete. It's still early but the style of football we're playing is very impressive and very rarely are we going into a game looking like we will lose. Daly is contributing very well in both goals and assists while Molloy is playing the best he has for us which is saying something considering he's already won a player of the year trophy.
A win and two draws in the league this month and progression in both of the cups means that for the fourth month running we are undefeated. We've beaten reigning champions Sligo Rovers for the second time this season and seem very comfortable at the moment.
Big blow to our season as he has been deadly on set pieces and very aggressive in defence. Has made a huge difference to the balance of the side and since Kehoe has been back in it has shown that Murphy is a class above. A good player for Kehoe to model himself on.
Two more league wins and a penalty shoot out win in the League Cup sees us through to the semi final! A remarkable achievement for a side that was only three years ago fighting it out in the first division.
With our game in hand played we now have a seven point lead over Sligo Rovers at the halfway point of the season. The question on everybody's lips. Can we keep it going?
1977 Cairdeas Tre Spoirt (Friendship Through Sports)
After consultation with the board and due to our good form this season we have decided to move into the 21st century with a re branding of our logo and an update to our pages.
Still losing a lot of money a month but it seems to be worth it as we're still going strong in the league and hopefully heading toward European football.
I believe we can make Europe this year so I've told the board as much and they've upped our wage budget by ?4K and doubled our transfer budget. Now to put my money where my mouth is.
Another injury even after being nursed back into the squad. Even game he plays now he receives a knock at some stage and has to come off. Not good for such a promising player.
Daire Daly has a wonderful month scoring four goals and laying on a few assists. He's been such a good pick up since the Limerick game when he scored four.
Transfer History
Six youngsters went out on loan this month with two permanent additions coming in on free transfers. One was Donald Love and the other was....
Stephen Hunt! Even at 35 he is still a quality player and will lend so much experience to this young side in the run in. Aside from Jon Macken who played a few games for us a couple of seasons ago this is the first recognizable name I've been able to bring in. Another small reminder of how we're progressing as a club.
Four wins and two draws see our undefeated run in the league extend to 22 games. The two draws at home are disappointing but our form on the road has been spectacular. As was mentioned earlier Daly scored four and Molloy ably assisted him with three of his own. Players like Daly and O'Connell have been impressive but Molloy has been so consistent all season.
So eleven games to go and a 15 point gap to Sligo Rovers who have a game in hand. It is now ours too lose and it will be interesting to see if the temperament of these players hold up if we do lose considering they haven't been in this position before. Its a 22 point gap to fifth place so it's almost unimaginable that we wont have some form of European football next season which is exciting.
Our streak ends after 22 games at the hands of Dundalk after they score a late winner. An incredible run and one I don't think we'll repeat for a few years.
Seven games this month and we stumble along this month. After the loss to Dundalk in the league we beat Sligo Rovers to get thinks back to normal but the we lose again to Dundalk, this time in the League Cup semi final. Consecutive losses in the league to lowly Bohemians and Athlone Town was compounded with scrapping past St Pat's in the Challenge Cup Third round needing a replay and extra time to finally get by. All this was made the worse when Daly was injured in the first Dundalk loss. His ability to make a goal out of nothing was sorely missed.
Sligo Rovers make some ground up on us this month with Danny North banging in 25 goals for them this season. Seven games and eleven points means we can't afford to slip up again next month otherwise they will have all the momentum going into the finale. Danny Murphy has the second highest average rating in the league and at 35 I keep wondering when he's gonna drop off and start playing poorly but it never happens!
