Roddy over the moon with Oriel win
Credit:
Monaghan United came away from Oriel Park with an excellent victory on Friday night. After going a goal down after 23 seconds, Mons regrouped and a second half double from Jordan Keegan handed the visitors a crucial win. Speaking to *ExtraTime.ie* after the match, manager Roddy Collins said that it was a great win and knew the performance was coming.
"Any win is a great win, especially away from home. Under the circumstances, going a goal down after a minute. I knew this week we were going to get a performance. I don't mean in a footballing sense but there was a determination with the players that was required. We had a chat the other night and talked about desire and the necessity for that to get off the bottom of the table."
Michael Rafter gave the home side the lead inside the first minute and Collins wasn't worried knowing there was plenty of time left and had confidence that a goal for his side would turn the game.
"There's ninety odd minutes to go, to come up here and at least get one goal, that would have been a draw, I would have took a point at half-time. I felt if we got the equaliser it would open the game a little bit more and Jordan Keegan give him time and space and he'll punish you."
On Jordan Keegan, the former Floriana manager couldn't speak highly enough of him and he knows that they will have a job on their hands to keep a hold of him.
"Jordan has been having a fantastic game every time he's played this season. That's why there's clubs looking at him in England. He's a top player. We'd like to be able to hold onto him but we won't stand in his way."
Keegan put in a man of the match performance but the Mons boss was highly impressed with the performance of Tony Griffiths.
"It's a great finish (Keegan's first goal), but he's done it before. Jordan is capable of doing that on a regular basis. It's just getting the play down to the other end of the pitch for him, we brought him onto the right hand side to see how it suited him and it did.
"Everyone's talking about Jordan but I thought that Tony Griffiths was absolutely brilliant tonight. He played up front, everything went up, stuck, he brought the challenge to the two big strong defenders. I was delighted with Tony Griffiths as I was with everybody, the attitude right the team was brilliant. We've played better and got nothing, but the attitude was brilliant."
