GALWAY’S RONAN MURRAY is just happy to be enjoying his football again after a difficult spell in England.
The 26-year-old attacker, who has been named SSE Airtricity/SWAI Player of the Month for August, had previous stints with Ipswich and Notts County, before moving closer to home and joining Galway United.
And three league goals as well as an FAI Cup hat-trick against Killester in recent times suggest Murray is playing with a smile on his face again, after linking up with the Premier Division side last year.
“I’ve enjoyed every single minute of it, even if the results on a Friday night haven’t always been what we wanted,” he says. “But when you play the likes of Cork and Dundalk, the intensity they play with week in week out, it shows how high the standard is at the top and you want to show you can play at that level when you come up against them, you strive to compete with them at that level.
“I feel as if I came home from England with a freshness, I wasn’t enjoying it over there and I wanted to get back to feeling like a 15, 16, 17-year-old again, trying my hardest in every game and wanting to impress.
That feeling and desire had left me through injuries and the different setbacks I had in England. That sort of stuff, those difficulties, get on top of you over there.
“You hear about footballers talking about falling out of love with the game and people will wonder how that can be.
But when you’re on that side of things, it’s a business environment and the love and the heart starts to go out of it. It’s constantly money driven and I’m glad that I have come back to my roots.
“I’m not saying that I wasn’t giving it my all on a Saturday but when you have that love for the game, it definitely helps to find an extra five, 10% you might need in training to keep working as hard as possible. I’ve started to like the game a lot more.”
While delighted that his recent efforts were recognised in the form of the player-of-the-month accolade, Murray insists he would swap it “10 times out of 10 to get the club out of the current position and I believe we can get out of it”.
With six games to play, Galway are 11th on 26 points, with Finn Harps in ninth on 30 points one club they will almost certainly need to surpass to avoid relegation.
While most critics consider Shane Keegan’s men as strong candidates for the drop at this late stage of the season, Murray and his team-mates are remaining optimistic.
It comes from the top, from Shane [Keegan] and from the more senior players. The likes of David Cawley, Stephen Folan, Colm Horgan is our captain. I see myself as one of those now too and we have to keep everyone on their toes.
“We’re only looking to the Derry game, but we all know that there are six games left and they are six Cup finals for us. We have to keep our energy levels high and go for it.”
The forward is unsure why his club have found themselves in such a perilous position, but admits performances have not been good enough overall.
It’s hard to put a finger on just one reason. All of us, our footballers, we all like to play and maybe there has been a naivety on that side of things, trying to play in the wrong places at the wrong time and that has killed us.
“Teams have capitalised on that and at the other end, we’re not making the most of the chances we have made, so that has been a problem too.
The table doesn’t lie in September, but we haven’t been in bad form for the last couple months. It’s all about getting results from here on in and whether we play the best football in the world or the worst, it doesn’t matter once we win games.
“I feel as if we have shown that fighting spirit from day one and we have a tight-knit group here who will battle together too. We believe we should be higher in the table but there have been times when we have let ourselves down.”
On a different note, hailing from Mayo, Murray naturally has a keen interest in this weekend’s All-Ireland SFC final. A big GAA fan, he is still hoping to attend the game, despite a sparsity of tickets available for the climactic Croke Park encounter.
It’s all that’s on anybody’s mind. It’s the only topic of conversation and who can get tickets. I’m hoping to go, fingers crossed. Where I’m from, Belmullet, it’s very rural. And other than the beautiful views and the times we get nice weather, sport is the focal point for everyone.
“Whether it’s a sliotar, a football, or a soccer ball, you pick it up and play, and that’s what I did. I played GAA for the club (Belmullet) until I was 15 and then I had to give it up for the soccer when I signed (for Ipswich). I had the choice to make and I made the soccer one.”
Meanwhile, when he’s not playing football, Murray works in a gym doing personal fitness.
Football isn’t going to last forever so I’m getting some experience on this side of things with the fitness,” he adds.
“I’m touching on it and juggling the two for now, football and fitness. One keeps the mind off the other, so you’re not bogged down and in that same old routine all the time. I like to help people out too and I’ve found a passion for it — I like it.”
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my god Leinster are dull to watch these days
That is 80 mins I’ll never get back. Awful stuff. Good result for Leinster against their bogey team.
Awful to watch. Connacht game is a cracker!
MOC OUT
Well the good news is we’re within 4 points of the top of the table with a few juicy head to heads coming up, but again, performance was terrible.
Makes those two points dropped in Italy last week all the more glaring when we look at how close we could be pushing for top spot.
The sooner Sexton is back and MOC and Gopperth leave this province the better.
Not nother cent of my money will be spent on any Leinster product until moc is gone.
I won’t stand by and watch Leinster fall apart, if the powers at Leinster want to pay Matt O’Connor to destroy everything that Leinster stand for then they can do that without the money I spend.
I will not protest at Leinster games because the players deserve better but I will do is online and through my wallet
Frank you can accept what’s happening and blindly follow matt’s army if you like but I want what’s best for Leinster. We have no given right to win trophies but we can demand that Leinster does it’s best and at the moment this man’s is no where near the standard required.
Buy a Munster jersey? it’s sheep like you that will hand munster the league.
Spoofer O’ Connor has the same game plan for every match
Game plan? What game plan? It looked like 15 players playing off the cuff? Stark contrast to Schmidt’s definite a well thought out game plans. Note to Leinster CEO – no more premiership coaches please.
As two dimensional as it is it’s still a gameplan: 1) Aggressive Line Speed in defence 2) Kick chase to pressurise back 3, and that’s it!
It’ll work against some teams, and sadly might even win us another Pro 12 (although doubtful), but it won’t stand up to Toulon or Clermont
Hard fought win well done Leinster from a Munster fan …roll on Dec 26th in Thomond park
I’d say you’re feeling confident Kevin…?
From a Munster fan, who’d gives a fu*k!
MOC and Gopperth are killing Leinster. Truck loads of of talent being wasted through a draconian style of play. It’s a crime against Irish rugby after the way the same players played under Smidth! I actually wasted 80 mins of my life watching that shite. This coming from a Galway man.
MOC and Gopperth suit the limited player pool at Leinsters disposal. You can only work with what you have and MOC is getting the best out of the group.
Really summed up my opinion on O’connor when the stadium announcer accidentally said jordi murphy was replacing kirchener at full back and I though it was a legit sub because of MOC persistent stupid decisions both player wise and tactically. The sooner he is gone the better, never been so bored in my life watching a leinster match.
I genuinely was close to falling asleep…it was awful
I think the ECup will be the focus for the next couple of weeks, hopefully all Irish teams are successful.
Turgid stuff – depressing how far Leinster have regressed under MOC.
Leinster win a penalty from 10 yards out with two mins to go – chance to scrum it again and send the Ospreys B team home with o points.
Couldn’t believe they took the penalty kick – winning by 6 points instead of 3 points is worth….. nothing extra. A dull, no risk, conservative decision, befitting the gameplan.
Laboured, boring and lucky!
There was another game happening only up the road earlier in the day where the Leinster a’s were playing. Despite an inferior opposition, Girv Dempsey had them throwing the ball around at every opportunity and at times it was a joy to watch with some really exciting back play.. A far cry from that boring rubbish that happened in the RDS. A shame that more were not there to see them play.
Was at that game, it was a great show alright
Who won? Who shone?
Well in the Leinster A match the whole team were great, in the Ospreys game I would say jack Conan, and one or two others were good
67-12. Agree with Jamie, the whole team were serious contributions and again it was just simple free flowing rugby, € 10 to watch an exhibition! Cian Kelleher and Mick McG took their tries very well. Being able to watch the in person you really see the leaders on the pitch. Marsh and Macken ran the show yesterday. People give out about Macken saying he can’t pass, bashes it up the middle etc, etc well anyone who was there yesterday will see that the lad has got a serious footballing brain and can really play. Granted the opposition were not exactly Champions Cup level but the point being that girv is obviously a coach that wants to play an expansive game and this brought out the best in them. Same for Marsh. Even if MOC is gone next season, with Sexton back and Mads there he will continue to find it difficult to break into the team.
Marsh has got serious vision, possibly even more raw talent in certain aspects of his game than either of the two internationals ahead of him. Similar to George Ford. However sadly we may never get to see at the very highest level.
Missed the Leinster game because I was out. Glad I didn’t rush home after seeing the comments here. Glad they won it though. Caught the second half of the Connacht game and it was a cracker. Really delighted to see them doing so well this year. Given the qualification for Europe from pro 12 is heavily stacked against them, I’m delighted to see them doing so well. It would soften the cough of the English if all 4 Irish provinces were to qualify for champions cup next year without one being “gifted” the spot. Being honest, if they don’t get in next year and sebre do, it really makes a mockery of the new “fairer” qualification system.
Sorry, Zebre. Slip of the finger there.
It’s like watching England
Sky sports
Leinster’s kicking game was really poor today. You can really see the difference between the quality of box kicks when Ireland and Leinster play. There was hardly a single contestable kick from Reddan and when it was kicked well, it wasn’t chased with any real intent. The whole second half seemed to revolve around the Ospreys pinning Leinster in their own 22 and Leinster then kicking it back to them.
Whilst this was a good result for Leinster, their performance left a lot to be desired. Unfortunately, this has been the case too often this season.
What happened to Leinster?
Incredibly boring to watch.
Nacewa, Sexton, BOD, Cullen, Hines, Rocky Elsom, Thorn all left, D’arcy, Reddan, Boss, Ross and Jennings hit their mid thirties while Fitzgerald, SOB and Strauss became permanently crocked. It’s quite obvious why Leinster are in the state they’re in but some fans choose to deny reality and laughably blame MOC and Gopperth for their woes.
Not for the first time. Not even a mention of connachts game today on thescore.ie. why?
My mistake. Made this before the Connacht articles came out
Is ‘The Swerve’ being groomed for top dog?
We hope so!!!
This isn’t on TV is it?
Tis
On TG4 and Sky Sports 2 but too late now!