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Herity Heaps Praise On Flaherty And Byrne
By Daire Walsh
DAVID Herity heaped praise on Declan Flaherty and Johnny Byrne after the Coill Dubh duo played a starring role on their return to the Kildare fold at St Conleth’s Park, Newbridge on Saturday.
After missing out on last year’s Christy Ring Cup success, Flaherty and Byrne are back in harness for the 2021 season. They were deployed in the pivotal positions of centre half-back and centre half-forward as the Lilywhites comfortably defeated Donegal on a scoreline of 4-29 to 0-14 in their National Hurling League Division 2B opener.
“The two boys are improving every single training session. They’re getting loads of hurling in. Obviously they’ve been hurling away with Coill Dubh for the last few years. It’s getting up to the inter-county pace of things,” the Kildare manager remarked after the game.
“The lads are progressing brilliantly and physically they’re very strong lads as well. They’ve a huge amount of experience from all the years with Kildare. Not just to hurling, but their experience and physicality is massive for us.”
Of the new rules and regulations on display in Newbridge, Kildare benefited most from the one that allows them to use seven permanent substitutes. Led by Conor Dowling and Caolan Smith, the home team’s bench contributed a combined total of 1-7 and Herity is delighted with the competition for places within his squad.
“That’s what we’ve always tried to do with Kildare. Try and get a very strong panel together and I’m very happy that we have that at the moment. I think it’s brilliant that the GAA have brought in that seven sub rule. Because there’s a huge amount of lads that have put in a massive amount of training since Christmas. It’s great to actually give them a bit of a chance now.”
Next up for Kildare is another home encounter on Sunday, this time at the Kildare Centre Of Excellence in Hawkfield against Donegal’s provincial rivals Derry. Having failed to get the better of them in the last two league campaigns, Herity is expecting another tough challenge from the Oak Leaf men.
“There was two points in it here two years ago and it was level in Derry last year. It’s going to be a very, very competitive game. They’ve a lot of experience. They were very unlucky, they lost the last two Division 2B finals. They’ll do everything they possibly can to get up this year,” Herity added.