Henderson pleased despite EA defeat

Waterford United manager Stephen Henderson admitted his delight after the full time whistle despite his side losing 2-1 to Dundalk in the RSC on Tuesday evening, in one of their best performances of the season so far from the Blues.

Before the game, Henderson wanted to restore some pride after a poor showing in Derry last Saturday evening, describing himself as “hugely disappointed” afterwards.

Getting back to the basics was important for Waterford, and Henderson told Extratime he was happy with the return from his players on the night.

“It couldn’t have been any worse that last week to be honest. We had a meeting before the game and everything tonight was based on our performance. It was about getting back to what we do as a team. We worked really hard in the middle of the park and we won an awful lot of second ball.

“Our movement off the front two that turned into a four was excellent, the interchange between them was brilliant. Liam Kearney was back to his best, there was a lot of really good stuff there tonight, so we’re delighted with that.”

Despite promotion being the number one priority in Waterford this season, Henderson admits it was still a game they really wanted to win but recent form may have hindered their chances.

“Tonight we wanted to do well in the cup but I couldn’t have foreseen what was going to happen the last couple of weeks leading up to this. Our form dipped dramatically, we were losing games that we deserved to lose but they were games we didn’t see ourselves losing so it was important we got ourselves back and I think we done that tonight."

With injuries having plagued Waterford over the last couple of weeks, players have had to fill in the gaps and play where they may usually have no players, none more so that having to use John Kearney and Paul McCarthy in central defence against Shelbourne, both who are centre midfielders by trade.

“People understand the jobs they have which they probably didn’t really understand what we were trying to do earlier on. Players’ getting back into their natural positions has obviously helped deeply. It was great to see Willie [John Kiely] scoring again, hopefully we can get Vinny [Sullivan] scoring and we’ll be flying.”

Having won their six opening games of the season, Henderson believes that if his side can keep injury free that they can embark on another similar run and keep their promotion ambition alive.

“All I wanted was to do the basics; keep the ball and keep the game simple, that’s all we try to do here. I probably tried to complicated it a bit more for them over the last few weeks, trying to get players into positions they aren’t familiar with.

“We’re glad to have everyone back now and if we get a bit of luck with injuries, keeping players injury free and keeping the squad together, I think we can go on a run like we did at the start of the season.”