Fermanagh manager Joe Baldwin was left frustrated by the amount of time played at the end of Saturday’s opening league encounter against Monaghan as the Farney bagged a goal deep in added on time to snatch the win in Clones.

Fermanagh had taken the lead through Danny Teague in the 74th minute, and the Monaghan goal arrived in the 77th minute despite only five minutes signalled by the fourth official.

Baldwin also stresses though that his players need to look to themselves for why they didn’t win the game, with the Erne boss admitting that they missed too many chances.

“The fourth official had signalled five minutes and Danny got a point to put us one up within that time. Six minutes was then up and it went into the seventh minute when they got their goal.

“If you signal five minutes additional after 35 minutes, how do you find another two minutes inside that, because there was no substitutions made inside that time.

“I would be disappointed with that but there was a load of things that we have got to work on, and more than looking at referees we have to look in the mirror at ourselves. We missed more than enough chances to win that game,” he said.

Those missed chances, especially from frees, is something that Baldwin is keen to address this week at training and he hopes to enlist the help of former Antrim star Liam Watson as well as Barney McAuley to work on the issue.

“I spoke to Liam Watson already and I’m hoping to have him down on Friday night to address the issue. We had 13 wides on Saturday, unopposed wides, and we missed too many free.

“Barney McAuley will come in to help out too, we just want to get the best out of the boys,” he added.

Another thing frustrating Baldwin is the interpretation of the foul and he feels it is making coaching it almost impossible.

“I’ve been doing this for a very long time but I don’t know what I’m supposed to coach in terms of what is a foul. Some of the things that go on are just horrendous, and there is no consistency of it. It is very frustrating,” he added.

Despite those missed chances on Saturday, Baldwin is adamant that his side did enough to take something out of the game.

‘Disappointed’

“We are disappointed on the whole as a group. We didn’t play to our best – we acknowledge that – and we will work on that this week.

“But, we felt though that we definitely did enough to at the minimum deserve a draw out of the game, so to lose in the manner that we did in the very last seconds of the game, is a tough one to take.”

However, they will have to quickly put that behind them with a formidable Mayo side the visitor to Ederney this Saturday.

“We felt that was a six-pointer on Saturday, and we were 30 seconds away from elation, and now we’re down in the dumps, but we can’t feel sorry for ourselves.

“We know we are more than good enough to compete at this level – we just have to dust ourselves down and work hard this week ahead of the Mayo game, which is probably the toughest one we have.

“Mayo have been a different standard for a long time now, and we just have to come up with a game plan to try and stifle them,” he said.

And the Erne boss has a firm belief that the players will come good.

“There is no panic. I still have every faith that this bunch of players will come good. We just have to try and right those wrongs and the boys have to take responsibility for some of those themselves.”

Baldwin does say though that he intends to make some changes to the team for the clash.

“We will have to make a few changes, because there were a few boys who have put their hand up, and there are a few boys who are going to need a bit more work.

“We have that panel that we can shake it up a wee bit, and that is what we will look to do – to give the boys an opportunity and get game time into their legs.

“We will just have to go and compete, and give as good as we can, and hope that Mayo have an off-day, because we are very much the underdogs in this one.”

 

SUBSCRIBE TO THE IMPARTIAL REPORTER NOW FOR JUST £2 FOR 2 MONTHS OR SUBSCRIBE TO OUR BEST VALUE OFFER OF £52 FOR ONE YEAR. CLICK HERE FOR MORE.