Off and running, but Cannon and Letterkenny Gaels taking nothing for granted

If Letterkenny Gaels are to battle their way back into another Junior A Championship final, it’s players like Cormac Cannon who will be key.

The forward produced a quality display of point-scoring and free-taking, helping himself to 1-6 in Saturday last’s 3-15 to 2-2 victory over Naomh Colmcille in their Group A opener at Pairc Colmcille.

Following on from that impressive start, Gaels welcome Carndonagh this evening to the Glebe, with the side from Foden having also opened with victory last week, in their case against Na Rossa. Then Gaels have Na Rossa away and Pettigo at home. Last October, also in the Junior A Championship, Gaels were beaten 2-11 to 1-5 by Carndonagh. 

“Whether we get into a semi-final or a quarter-final we’ll take it,” Cannon said. “It’s knock out football, so as long as we progress, that’s all we can do. It’s going to be a very tough group. If you look at Carndonagh and Na Rossa, and how they’ve done in Division 3 this year, they’ve done incredibly well.”

Cannon would be first to point out that he’s only a small cog in the Gaels machine which on Saturday’s display alone, looks like they mean business. Under the stewardship of new joint-managers Dougie Corbett and Paul Melaugh, Gaels have retained the vast majority of the side that lost out in the 2021 decider to Downings.

And having managed to maintain their Division 2 status thanks to a very impressive league campaign, Cannon and his team-mates are now setting their sights on going one better than last year in the championship.

“We definitely left it behind us last year,” Cannon said, in reference to the disappointing performance against Downings. “That was the county final. At the minute we’ve only played our first group game. There’s a long way to go before we get back to that stage, but hopefully we can get there.”

The win over Naomh Colmcille was the perfect way to kick-start their campaign but Cannon insists it won’t be straight-forward when it comes to getting out of their group.

“It was a good victory. We knew coming down here today that we wanted to get the first points on the board for the Junior Championship so we’re happy to get that,” he said. “We went in at half-time happy with where we were at and we just wanted to kick-on after that. We’ve been on the road a fair while now with this team. In fairness to Naomh Colmcille, they had a very young team out there.”