“We’re giving this championship the best we can” - Conor Reid

It looks as if the months of November and December are going to be ultra busy for the young footballers of Four Masters as they chase success in many different competitions.

On Sunday last they ran up a tally of 6-17 against St Eunan’s in the Donegal U-21 Championship to secure themselves a place in the quarter-final of the competition.

The club’s minors, reigning Ulster minor club champions, found out on Saturday that they will start their defence against Monaghan champions, Scotstown, probably towards the end of this month.

This week many of Sunday’s U-21 panel will be part of the Abbey VS team that will take on St Pat’s, Dungannon in an historic first MacRory Cup game for the school. 

And when you add in that most of the rest of the U-21 panel will be involved in Third Level competitions, you can see that they will be getting plenty of football.

On Sunday they had things very much their own way, much easier than expected according to U-21 captain Conor Reid.

“We wouldn’t have been expecting it to be as easy as it was. I suppose they were in an Ulster campaign last night (Saturday), maybe they were feeling that a bit.

“We needed that win after last week.  We were poor last week (against Glenswilly). We needed a good performance again because we played well against Dungloe the first week out.”

After an average start, Four Masters hit three goals in as many minutes around the 20  minute mark and central to the win were the Carr brothers, Seanán and Turlough, who were missing the previous week against Glenswilly.

“They’re massive, those two boys, in fairness to them. When they play together they are lethal and once they get a sniff of goal they are not pulling back. They were a big miss last week and we were happy to get them back.

“But everything there today was savage. Kevin Muldoon was back, Oisin Doherty and there were boys that didn’t even get in today.”

Reid was particularly enthused about having Muldoon back playing for the club after his soccer commitments with Sligo Rovers. Muldoon is one of a number of the young Four Masters players who have come under the radar of Jim McGuinness in recent times.

“He (Muldoon) was tied up with the soccer a lot but it’s good to have him back now. He has some legs on him, some pace and he carries a lot of ball for us. We will take Kevin any day we can get him.  He is getting back into it now.

“They are a savage bunch but I don’t think they are out of place up there at all.”

In what is a big week for the club with many of the players due to play in a first ever MacRory Cup game with Abbey VS, Reid feels it will push levels even higher.

“Yeah, it’s massive. They are playing at a good level now and you can see it when they come on to the pitch. They drag us older boys up with them so they keep a good standard. They are going into MacRory this week and they have Scotstown (in the Ulster minor championship in a few weeks) which won’t be easy either. They are a savage bunch of boys.

“It’s a big load on the bodies but the boys love it. They know how to manage themselves but they are well used to it at this stage.”

With their quarter-final spot secured, Reid is glad to have a week off before they know who their opponents will be.

“We don’t know who we will be playing but we will get to see these other teams playing next week. We’ll take whoever we get. We have a week’s break which will do us no harm,” said Reid, who added that most of the lads would be playing college football or MacRory this week.”

Reid, the elder statesman of the team, has plenty of company on the trip to Dublin and DCU with Calum McCrea, Seanán Carr, Leo McGowan and Daniel McIntyre in the travelling party.

“It’s nice to have them up there and training together.”

The captain is hoping for a good run in the U-21 championship and feels the team is in a good place.

“We have come off a good few minor campaigns there now and we are starting to build that team together. We’re definitely giving this championship the best go we can. We definitely are fancying ourselves to be one of the teams to give it a proper go this year,” said Reid.