Issue link: http://digitaleditions.uberflip.com/i/1273037
16 | SUMMER 2020 | www.ladiesgaelic.ie RISE OF WATERFORD Current manager Curran thinks there has been a big step up in standards across the county, with Ballymacarbry no longer holding the majority of slots in the county panel. "In general Waterford has a low number of teams playing the game. At senior level there are only four teams taking part in the championship. You'd like to think that could get up to seven or eight teams competing at senior level. I think those four teams are closer together than it would have been in the last few years. "You'd be hoping that more Intermediate teams would be able to push on up and make that step up to give us a bigger number of Senior teams. There has been an improvement in it, definitely. The aim is that more clubs will get to a higher level. "To be fair, I think we have a good number of players from around the county. We have five or six players from Ballymac. But we have five from Stradbally, another five from Abbeyside. I don't think there are as many players from Ballymac as there would have been in previous years. They haven't a total monopoly on it. Other players are producing top players, so that is spread around a bit more. "It is challenging though. Junior teams may not be training at such a high a level as the other teams are. It is vitally important that they have the opportunity to come into a Senior set up where they are training at the highest level, where they are facilitated and coached at the top level. That's how you will get the most improvement out of the players". CURRAN ON THE NEXT GENERATION... At underage level in Waterford we were in Division 1 in minor last year. We got some heavy beatings. Ironically enough, we got two of that team on to the senior panel last year. Our goalkeeper Rosie Landers and Kelly-Ann Hogan were definitely a big fillip for the squad last year. I feel that we have good structures in place and hopefully in years to come we will start becoming more competitive at Minor. We are in the B grade this year so we are hoping that they will be competitive in that and if we can have some success there it'd be great. That would all breed confidence through the grades. The structure is definitely right there now, so in the years to come we are hoping to reap the rewards with a regular stream of players coming through at adult level. McGRATH ON HER 2017 MUNSTER FINAL WIN OVER CORK... We beat Kerry and Cork in that Munster championship. It was brilliant. I remember playing Cork in Fraher Field, almost your back garden. Cork were the big team in the country, they have such a massive history in the game. Any day if you can compete with them you're doing really well. I just remember the game being so intense. It was just brilliant winning that day, holding on and digging out the win in the end. It was great for Waterford football, it instilled real confidence in us and we realised we could compete with the big teams on our day. CURRAN ON A RETURN TO ACTION It's great to have the game coming back. In fairness to the LGFA it is very hard to know what the best way to go is in terms of fixtures. Some people are of the view that maybe it's too late in the year to be playing the Championship. But if we are being fair, the more condensed structure where everyone is guaranteed two league games and if you top your group you go to a semi-final and a final. Most teams would have been together in December, doing hard training looking forward to the summer ahead anyway. They won't have as many games as they might have liked, but to be fair that is not easy to organise from a fixtures point of view. That's a real challenge. CURRAN ON CLUB v COUNTY... We are in a bit of a vacuum at the moment really. What I've learned in this job is that there is always a new challenge around the corner. I think the challenge that most inter-county mangers are going to face now is how you bridge that gap between now and preparing for Championship. The club versus inter-county scene, that old chestnut is still there, and I think it is going to be a real challenge to manage that going forward for the next number of months. I think everybody would like to see a solution to that to be found in the men's and women's game.