Kildare call in the imports

The Kildare selectors have handed championship debuts to Brian Lacey and Karl O'Dwyer for next Sunday's Leinster SFC tie against Dublin at Croke Park.

Former Tipperary player Lacey and ex-Kerry star O'Dwyer played their first competitive games during the recent league campaign, having transferred to local clubs.

Veteran defender, Davy Dalton, has been performing well of late and the All Star has earned a recall to the fullback spot in his second competitive game since last year's championship.

Dalton replaces the injured Ronan Quinn who played there for most of the league before incurring a leg injury.

Former defender John Finn returns from injury to take his place at right half back where he has been playing in recent challenge games.

Free-taker Padraig Gravin missed most of Kildare's league campaign, having gone to America at the start of the season. However, he is preferred to Padraig Brennan at corner forward. Newcomer Brennan was Kildare's most consistent scorer during the league but Gravin's championship experience from last year was probably the telling factor.

Kildare Team: C Byrne; B Lacey, D Dalton, K Doyle; J Finn, G Ryan, A Rainbow; N Buckley, W McCreery; E McCormack, D Kerrigan, D Earley; M Lynch, K O'Dwyer, P Gravin.

Although Limerick were understandably despondent in the wake of Sunday's Munster Hurling Championship defeat by Cork, those involved with the team felt certain that the loss would not crush them. While many of the team and management relaxed yesterday, county secretary Jimmy Hartigan said that in the long term, the defeat would not prove too demoralising.

He acknowledged the fact that the new League format might give Limerick a nine-month break from the inter-county scene and he suggested that such a prolonged rest would leave them hungry for competition again.

After Sunday's match, Gary Kirby reminded his colleagues that at 31, he was the team's eldest player and all involved felt that talk of Limerick slipping into decline was premature.

While the team did not specifically discuss the reasons for Sundays loss, it was generally felt that a failure to capitalise on first halfopportunities stung them and that Cork, having ably managed the breeze in the first 35 minutes, used it well in applying incessant pressure on Limerick's back line as the game closed.

Meanwhile, Monaghan manager Eamon McEneaney yesterday wryly condemned Celtic Park as a luckless venue for his county, marvelling at how Sunday's outcome had virtually mirrored the previous year's result.

Ruling what he perceived as being soft goals which his defence conceded to Derry, he remained adamant that team captain Edwin Murphy did not deserve to be sent-off for his 10th minute challenge on Seamus Donwey.

"Possibly you could say that the referee would have been justified in booking him. But he just checked his man, it happens a lot in gaelic. I suppose we'll get tarred with the same old brush now, it'll be said we had a man sent off last year as well but I have always sent my players out to play football and anyone could tell you that off the ball play isn't Edwin's form.

He realised that Monagahan were up against it as soon as Derry claimed their second goal but felt that overall, his team did salvage something form the game.

"Obviously the sending off disrupted our plan and when you give goals like that to a team such as Derry, you are going to have to be in super form to come back. Some of our lads didn't perform, they know that and naturally, they were very disappointed yesterday. But they were still full of running at the very end and it's a matter of taking a few weeks now to recharge the batteries and then the whole process begins again."

McEneaney felt that despite the proliferation of bookings, the match was not particularly ill-spirited. Agreeing that Derry seemed to have stepped up a gear since the sides last met in the League, he predicted that they would probably emerge from Ulster if they retained the same standard of play.

"Well, you'd have to take that with a wee pinch of salt", laughed Derry's Enda Gormley when he learned that a number of Ulster bosses had given his county the nod for the provincial title.

Gormley, who returned to the playing field yesterday after retiring and having sat out the winter as a selector, felt there was room for improvement.

"Ok, we were delighted to win by that margin but we were poor in some respects. We over carried a lot, for instance. But I was pleased that we were ruthless enough to kill the game off when we got the second goal, that we never let them back in".

Gormley, an integral cog in Derry's 1993 All-Ireland side, made his return for Derry yesterday at half-time. He was persuaded to rejoin the panel after showing consistently impressive form at club level.