Paddy Carr: 'Did you not see me? I was running down there to say it was wide'

Donegal manager Paddy Carr says he had no doubt that Paul Conroy’s late free to win this afternoon’s Allianz League Division 1 clash was narrowly off target.

With the score at 1-9 apiece, Conroy faced a tricky kick to win it for the Tribesmen, with time up in front of the newly-christened Dr James McDaid Stand. The Galway midfielder gave it plenty of wellie and it looked to be heading over at the Town End only to be signalled wide as it tailed.

“It was definitely wide!,” Carr said afterwards. “Did you not see me? I was running down there to say it was wide. It was actually wide because I was in line with it.”

Padraig Joyce, the Galway manager, admitted he was celebrating with the ball in the air but also felt Conroy’s effort was narrowly off target. And like his counterpart, Carr felt Donegal had enough chances to win the points, although in the end wasn’t overly disappointed with the draw.

Galway boss Padraig Joyce: 'If Donegal had the shooting boots on, we'd have lost'

Galway manager Padraig Joyce was happy to take a point home from Letterkenny against a Donegal side who produced plenty of chances over the 70 minutes

“Well you know when you're in my situation you tend to have to live your life hoping that its half full rather than half empty,” Carr said. “Look there's no doubt about it that there's lots of different ways to look at it.

“The reality is that if we had converted a number of the really good chances that we created there, we could have dealt with the game very handy and won it by eight to ten points really.

For spells in the first half where one side would score and then the other, there were similarities from Clones last week, only for Monaghan to finish much stronger and beat Donegal 1-20 to 0-15. It was the same trend at O’Donnell Park for 20 minutes and although Donegal went five up after Oisin Gallen’s penalty, it was Galway who led by two in the closing straight and then one in injury time. Jason McGee it was, who restored parity.

“It couldn't be better inside the dressing room in terms of the honesty of effort and what we are asking lads,” Carr added. “I said it last week that there were things that had to be learned coming out of Clones. In a certain way that was addressed with what went on out there on the field today.

“We asked for a massive, massive workrate and that was there. We are seeing things that we are trying to create on the training field and bring that into a game situation.I don't want to go into individuals but we had four or five lads there who are only playing their second game of football in the last six months.

“You could see that their performances were a lot better than what they were last week. The other thing is as the players get to know us and we get to know them, one thing that you're always hoping that's there in an abundance at this level of football and that is heart and character.

“You can't get that out if it's not in them. I'd like to think that the GAA people of Donegal saw it today. It's there in abundance with them. That point could prove to be very useful. If we had got two points it would have been magical but we learned the kind of lessons we need to.”