Mark Dowd hailed Roscommon’s ‘massive composure’ after they finished with a flourish to be crowned Connacht football champions for the first time since 2019.

Trailing by six points after Damien Comer netted for five-in-a-row chasing Galway in the 61st minute, the Rossies rallied with eight unanswered points down the home stretch to send their supporters at a packed King & Moffatt Dr Hyde Park into raptures.

“I suppose it backs up what we've been trying to do all year, since the early days when we gathered a panel and started putting plans in place. We wanted a physical team that was able to compete with the top teams. We showed that today, that we could,” the Roscommon manager told reporters.

“It gave us that belief. We wanted it that we were going down the home straight in games and that we were still going to be in it. We showed that today.

"That game could have ended up on the losing side of it as well, but it showed massive composure from the lads I felt there in those last 10 minutes. They just kept their wits about them, they took it play by play and we got our scores there towards the end just to get over the line.” 

Dowd, who is in his first season in the hotseat, continued: “I'm delighted just for the bunch of lads.

“The amount of work they've put in. We probably haven't seen enough of it these days in Roscommon and hopefully, you saw it there last week with the U17s, U20s, things are working for us here at the moment. It's the people that are in there, the players that are in there.

“Everyone is putting their shoulder to the wheel and that's brilliant.”

Tweet

Most Read Stories