DUAL players can present problems for managers – but there aren’t enough of them as far as St John’s, Belfast football boss Aaron Douglas is concerned.
Some of the Corrigan Park club’s stars have opted for hurling only this season, leaving Douglas to call up a few minors – but they’ve still reached the Antrim SFC quarter-finals after beating city rivals Rossa last weekend.
“It’s public knowledge that we’ve a few lads missing this year that we would have had in previous years. You have to deal with that, cope with that – but that also means those kids playing wouldn’t have got their opportunities and experienced that win.
“We’re in transition, we’re building a squad for the future. It’s a blessing in disguise in some ways, but you’d also love to have those boys there that are missing. It’s hard to get the balance.”
Now he has to watch on nervously as St John’s host a re-match in the small ball code this Saturday evening, this time with Rossa having the advantage of knowing that a draw would secure third spot for them, and qualification for a quarter-final place.
Douglas could be forgiven for hoping that the Johnnies hurlers don’t progress, to give the dual players he does have some rest, but he insists he wants to see the club winning:
“Next Saturday night against Rossa in Corrigan is the focus now, to go and beat them if we can. That’s going to be the exact same, a battle right to the wire.
“I’ll be wincing, absolutely, like I was in Ballymena, and Dunloy – you just hope they get through, and play.”
His footballers have a tough test ahead of them, against Casement’s of Portglenone, as he readily acknowledged:
“John McKeever takes them, they won the League last year, and I know how hard he has worked with them. They’re building a squad and they’ve come out of their group fairly easily.
“They’re a well-drilled outfit and I know that’s going to be one hell of a difficult game – but we’ll look forward to it.
“We’ll prepare as best we can – most of these lads are going to play in the hurling championship against Rossa and Portglenone will be sitting preparing for us. But, listen, we’re used to that and we’ll try our best to work together, the hurlers and the footballers….
“It’s going to be a really difficult challenge but we’re happy to be in the quarter-final. This is my third year and the target was to get out of the group – we’ve nothing to lose now, I suppose.”
St John’s hope to have county footballer Conor Hand available to face Portglenone after missing the Rossa game due to an injury sustained in training.
Teenage attacker Daire King will be suspended after receiving a straight red card against Rossa, but manager Douglas had sympathy for the youngster: “He’s only a kid, only 17, he’s Lower Sixth in school. He set up the goal and then…he’ll learn from that.
“We’ll look after him, he’s only starting on his senior football career. He has a lot of talent, a lot of potential. But you have to be disciplined in big games like this. The emotion probably got to him a little bit, but he’ll be all right.”