Seamus O’Shea And Ballymun Left To Sweat On Fitness Of Dublin Legend

Ballymun Kickhams secured their place in the Dublin senior football championship quarter-finals with a 1-20 to 1-13 victory over St Jude’s, but an ankle injury to John Small provided some late concern for manager Seamus O’Shea.

Small had featured prominently before going off towards the end, with Mayo legend O’Shea unable to offer a firm update on his condition immediately afterwards.

With two weeks until their next championship outing, Ballymun will be hoping the defender’s injury does not overshadow an encouraging performance.

Seamus O’Shea And Ballymun Left To Sweat On Fitness Of Dublin Legend

Asked after the game whether he had spoken to John Small about the knock, Seamus O’Shea said:

I didn’t yet, no. I hope it’s not too bad.

With the way the championship works now, you’re kind of every two weeks, so teams are going to be picking up injuries and it’s just a matter of minding yourselves between now and two weeks’ time.

Hopefully John isn’t too bad and the rest of them are OK as well, and we can recover well for Wednesday or Thursday night this week.

Fiach Andrews led the Ballymun attack with 1-3 to collect the man-of-the-match award, while Dean Rock contributed six points, five of them from play.

Keelin McGann added three points and James McCarthy also got on the scoresheet. Alongside Small, Evan Comerford and McCarthy were influential as Ballymun progressed without using Paddy Small.

The seven-point winning margin concealed a more uncomfortable spell in the second half.

Tom Lahiff was prominent for St Jude’s with three points, while Oisín Costello’s goal brought them back to within two and put the outcome firmly back in the balance.

O’Shea was particularly pleased with how his players handled that challenge.

It looked like we’d given ourselves a bit of breathing room there at some stage in the second half, and then, in fairness to Jude’s, they came back at us really well and got a goal.

I think the good thing from our perspective was that we responded on the back of that really well over the last eight or nine minutes and got some good scores.

In particular, I thought we did really well on the kickouts for the last six or seven minutes maybe, and that gave us a bit of momentum.

Ballymun’s experienced players helped them regain control, with Rock, McCarthy and Small continuing to make their presence felt.

Asked about their contributions, O’Shea said their appetite remains undiminished.

The lads are great. They’re still hugely impactful, obviously, and they’re as hungry as ever, in fairness to them.

In his first season with Ballymun, O’Shea was quick to credit the players themselves when asked about their willingness to work for one another.

I can’t take any credit for that. The lads are self-motivated. They’re a brilliant group. They don’t need much encouragement from me.

I think that’s just built into the DNA in Ballymun Kickhams.

Once you have that, and you throw in a bit of talent on top of it, you have a chance against anybody.

The immediate priority is recovery, with Small’s fitness among the issues to assess before Ballymun turn their attention to the last eight of the Dublin Senior Football championship.

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