'You get no points for coming close' Hat-trick hero Dowling delighted with Kildare's win over Down

“It is a great victory. That was the main goal at the start, to get a good performance in. We started strong, but, Down, they are always tough. We have played so many matches against them down the years so it was nice to get one up on them,” the words of Kildare’s hat-trick hero Cathal Dowling after their crucial 3-24 to 1-23 win over Down in Allianz Hurling League Division 1B.

“All these teams (Antrim, Down, Carlow) are looking to stay up, get their standards up and compete with these big teams. And win games too, we don’t want to just come up here and go through the motions. You look at that Clare game last week, we wanted to win that game. Every game we go into wanting to win it and the same will apply next week against Carlow.”

Dowling added, “It is great getting these big performances in. You come off the pitch, you’re tired, you’ve put in a good shift and you get no points for coming close. In terms of a team performance, the likes of Clare is what you are trying to get to so it was great to play at that pace last week and then get the points this week to add onto it.”

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Also speaking after the game, Kildare goalkeeper Paddy McKenna said: “The work the boys put in out the field (was incredible). With a man down for 40-odd minutes of the game and playing into a strong breeze in the second half you would have taken a one-point win. Credit to them, they put in some shift and the lads that came in off the bench too. Brian always asks them to contribute and put the shoulder to the wheel, and they were super.

“The boys (at the back) are deadly. In the league last year we played with a sweeper and it probably allowed them to be ‘looser’ for the want of a better term, but now we go man on man and it’s just a tussle and the boys love it. These lads are all hurlers too, they are not just man-markers. They want to get on the ball as soon as we turn over an attack so it’s great and it was a big asset there today. They (Down) conceded the puck-out a small bit so we were able to build from the back.”

The veteran goalkeeper also spoke of the confidence that was taken from The Lilies’ battle with Clare the week previous, as well as the overall disappointment that they couldn’t turn their half-time advantage into a famous victory.

McKenna added, “At the end of the game, losing by four points, you are frustrated not to have gotten closer. We knew when we went back and reviewed the game Tuesday that performance would not have been worth anything if we hadn’t come up here and got a result. That was the main thing, getting a result and a performance here today.

“The performance last week was good, but our problem has not been performing against the higher-quality teams in the past, it has been playing against teams of our own standard and lower where we can often drop to their level. Hopefully today has put an end to that, we went out on the front foot and kept going from there.”

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