Bench makes difference for Galway

With Drogheda United on the front foot and pushing for the opening goal, chances were going abegging early in the second half for Alan Mathews' side and Ian Foster responded by making a tactical switch. The Liverpudlian could well have looked to shore up a midfield that, even with an extra body, was looking increasingly vulnerable as Drogheda pushed forward in waves.

Alan Murphy was eager to enter the fray and may well have added, as he later did, some more bite to the cause, but Foster chose well in abandoning his preferred tactic of one up front, bringing on Declan Edwards for the ineffective Michael McGrath. It was a brave, well thought out move as Galway were struggling to support Vinny Faherty in any meaningful way.

Ten minutes later the game had swung in the visitor's favour, as Edwards' link up play made Galway competitive again; no longer was the opening goal a foregone conclusion for the home side.

Speaking afterwards, Foster explained the reasoning behind his changes and told how he had emphasised to his players in the dressing afterwards how much of a squad effort was required for this win.

"Unfortunately Iarfhlaith's broken his nose, so it wasn't a case that Iarfhlaith didn't want to continue, it was just a case that he couldn't stop the bleeding. Because of his position it was important that we made a change straight away. We couldn't wait for him to stop the bleeding. It's an unfortunate one for us but Paul (Sinnott) come in and did an excellent job for us.

"I said to the lads after the game, it just shows it's a 14-man game. The lads who came on changed the game for us. I thought Alan Murphy was excellent and kept us in possession, Declan run his socks off, as did Vinny all night. Paul came on and covered for Iarfhlaith fantastically well.

"It is a 14-man game, you know. You make changes after an hour, 70 minutes, 80 minutes, and you need that energy. You need fresh legs on the pitch, and hopefully someone can come on and nick you a goal like Declan Edwards did tonight."

Foster agreed that his side was second best for much of the encounter but was enthused by the way his side finished the game.

"No, it wasn't our best performance. But we showed plenty of character. It's difficult when you come up against a team who are desperate to get their first win on the board and we didn't quite handle it well enough first half. We gave the ball away an awful lot, but we showed a lot of character. We kept going, we kept pressing. We kept trying to pass.

"I'm not going to have a go at players for not controlling it as long as they're trying to do the right things. And we did all night. We didn't give up and we kept working hard. We changed the system a little bit and we've got the three points, and that's what it's all about."