Keith Long: 'The reality of putting a fresh team out is impossible'

Rónán Macnamara reports from Richmond Park

Bohemians’ manager Keith Long was proud of the character and resilience his makeshift side showed in fighting back from a seemingly unassailable 2-0 deficit away to St Patrick’s Athletic on Monday night to draw thanks to goals from Ross Tierney and Promise Omochere.

A poor first half display saw Bohs fortunate to head for the interval only a goal in arears and having given themselves a mountain to climb when Jason McClelland doubled Pats’ advantage on 48 minutes, Long was pleased with his sides fight.

“We didn’t play well first half,” he said, speaking after the game, “We were lucky to go in 1-0 down at half time.

“I suppose we got gifted the opportunity to get back in the game and we took it with both hands and we probably should have won the game on the balance of play in the second half but bearing in mind how bad we were in the first half I have to give the lads great credit to come back and show their character and resilience.

“We’re disappointed to have drawn but maybe it’s a fair result.”

The result means the Gypsies are still without a win in five league games and are one point behind fourth place Derry City with a game more played in the race for Europe.

Long’s charges have had a dip in form at just the wrong time it would appear but he puts that down to the congested fixture schedule his side have had to handle.

Despite that he is still hopeful that his team can have a massive say in the European race in the final three games.

“I hope so from our point of view, we’ve got Drogheda on Sunday now and Rovers then Sligo away so hopefully it will go down to the last game because we are still playing catch up.

“We have a lot to do to get that fourth position so Derry will be fighting hard like us but the resilience and the character that the group showed second half will hopefully stand to us.

“It’s our sixth game in 18 days, I hear Stevie [O’Donnell] talking about rotation and changing his squad because of the congestion.

“They have had four games in 14 days so it’s a lot for the boys to try and be consistently put out Friday, Monday. I think we’ve played 10 Friday, Monday games this year and Pats have played five, so I have to give the boys great credit for their endurance levels and their ability to go again.

“Results have been up and down of late, but we have a young squad, we rely upon our young players to come through and bolster the numbers that we have and it’s difficult, especially this time of year playing so many games on heavy pitches when you’re picking up muscle and joint injuries and there’s lots of fatigue coming into games.

“The reality of putting a fresh team out is impossible.”

With the likes of Dawson Devoy, Ross Tierney and Andy Lyons expected to be away on Ireland under-21 duty this month, Bohemians have taken it upon themselves to play their Dublin Derby game against Shamrock Rovers without the potentially absent trio to ease the workload on the rest of the squad.

“The nearest team to us with Friday, Monday games is Shamrock Rovers with six and we’ve had ten and everyone else has had five, all pre-scheduled at the start of the year. I suppose the reasons are that we have three players in the under-21 international team, we have made a conscious decision to give the players some sort of break by playing Rovers next Friday on the 12^th without the international players.

“That was a decision we made based on the workload of the players you know the fact the league wanted us to play on the fourth (Thursday) against Shamrock Rovers and again on the Sunday against Drogheda would have meant eight games in 24 days which is madness,” he added.

Gary Shaw: ‘You aren’t going to start talking about performances. It’s all about the result’ https://t.co/9GqQEetSRopic.twitter.com/tJnUFEujdX

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