Carlow players hoping for reaction after Curran exit

Carlow captain Mikey Bambrick says the players had hoped for an amicable split with former manager Shane Curran but felt obliged to respond his parting words last week.

Curran quit as the senior footballers' manager last Wednesday, a county board statement saying his decision was "...based on player-related issues which he believed were beyond the scope of the management team."

A longer statement subsequently released to some media outlets claimed that there had been "ongoing issues with certain players, which were further compounded by the failure of several squad members to return home with the team after last weekend's NFL game in London."

The Carlow players hit back, saying some member of the panels had stayed on in London but only with the prior agreement of management, and that blaming player issues was a smokescreen for longstanding issues "with the overall organisation and training environment throughout the league".

"There were a lot of frustrations being built up there in the past few weeks," captain Mikey Bambrick told RTÉ Sport at the launch of the Leinster SFC. "When this happened it was nearly like a release.

"It's tough on a lot of the players, when you hear stuff being said. That's what we wanted to address with that statement. It was more so just for the people of Carlow so that everyone knew what the story was.

"Stuff [players' concerns] was being highlighted, and it was being worked on in fairness, but I think it just wasn't working out.

"Come the end of it, we wanted to just move away mutually, hoping it was an easy departure on both sides, especially into championship. But unfortunately we're in the situation we're in.

"We're just looking to move past it now. Sometimes out of these things, you can nearly come out better on the other side of it. So that's what we're hoping for as players."

Shane Curran was only in charge of Carlow for seven months

The Barrow men don't have much time to regroup - they face Meath in a Leinster quarter-final in Navan on Sunday.

At this stage, no interim manager has been named, but Bambrick says the players are showing they remain committed.

"There's a lot of player-led stuff there at the minute, and it just shows the leaders we do have in the dressing room," he said.

"Coming down to trainings and taking trainings and stuff like that.

"The energy's been great there, the last two training sessions, post-London.

"So we're just trying to keep that momentum up now and building again, getting ourselves right for Meath. Then take it one step at a time."

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Carlow finished fourth in Division 4 with seven points and will be taking on a Royals outfit that were only one point off promotion to the top flight, albeit one that has also had its own post-league management departures in the shape of selectors Joe McMahon and Martin Corey.

"I don't think anyone from the outside really truly knows what's going on in any setup," said Bambrick.

"So if you're looking at Meath, looking at ourselves, you don't know what's going on.

"And you know, it's championship football at the end of the day, anything can happen. So we're just looking forward to the test.

"We've gotten some results. We haven't had a bad campaign. Obviously, we were hoping for better, but I wouldn't say we're in a bad position now going into the first round of championship.

"Playing against Meath will give a really good indication of where you're going to be at."

Watch Donegal v Derry in the Ulster Football Championship on Sunday from 1.15pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player. Follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1

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