Roscommon boss Dowd happy with final quarter as they hold off Donegal charge

Roscommon boss Mark Dowd was pleased that his side were able to finish strong and hold off the Donegal comeback to win by 2-20 to 0-20 in their Division 1 meeting in Dr. Hyde Park.

With the wind playing a huge part in both halves, Roscommon held an eleven-point lead at the break at 1-13 to 0-5.

Dowd and his backroom team were unsure if that would have been enough to stay in front, and within 15 minutes of the restart, they only led by two as Donegal piled on the pressure in the third quarter of the match.

But they dug deep in pivotal moments of the game, and Conor Hand’s goal with less than five minutes to play ensured they would get over the line.

“We got 1-7 in the second half, and that was a tough breeze to be playing against, so that was great to see,” Dowd said.

“We could have been coming in at half-time with a few more scores on the board, and it probably sharpened our focus a bit more in the second half, knowing that we couldn’t afford to step off Donegal because in fairness, they did kick a couple of good two-pointers in the second half and we could have been punished if more of those went over.

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“That was the key, getting our hands back on the ball again, because in quarter three, Donegal probably came up with a fair share of it and got their scores there, but towards the end of that and in quarter four, we got our hands on it a lot and started to control it a bit better.

“We weren’t risking shots, and we were looking for the good scores, which was important.

“It was a good controlled second-half performance, and I would have been very happy with that.”