Folan impressed by Blues' 'quality & diversity'

Stephen Folan hasn't had the easiest of times in football thus far. Sunday evening marked both a beginning and an end for the Galway native – a beginning of a new era for both him and his football club, and an end to the past struggles he's faced so far. Stephen spoke to Extratime.ie about his Airtricity League debut.

While Cork City has found their feet courtesy of an impressive Setanta Sports Cup run, Sunday was Limerick's first game in a major competition this season. While some may have been without game time in quite a while, Folan was probably the most eager of the lot to start the 2013 campaign having been without first-team football in so long. The young centre half admitted he thought his performance was good.

“I thought I did really well, considering it was my first competitive game in a long time. I haven't played a competitive match since October. The more games I'm going to play, the better I'll get. It's about brushing up on the little things now, so when it comes to later on in the season, everything will be perfect. That way there will be good fluidity in my game. With that being the first game, I'm really happy with how it went – I thought I had a good game, I was very solid and managed to keep the team compact. I think my decision making could be a little bit quicker but obviously that's going to come with more games.”

The 4-3-3 shape that Limerick adopted was impressive. It allowed for a lot of tidy pass and move football to be played and overall, it entertained the crowd that turned up to witness the club's first Premier Division game in almost two decades. Folan believes Limerick could adopt any shape because the quality and diversity of player that Stuart Taylor has at his disposal.

“If we play 4-4-2 or a 4-3-3 or any shape that the manager and his assistant decide upon, we've got the players to adapt to that. I think that's key. The manager knows his players and what type of football suits them. A lot of players played a lot of first-team games last year, whether it be young Dave O'Leary who had a full season last year, Danny Galbraith who had a lot of games, Williams; the same. There's a lot of experience there but there's a nice mixture of youth and flair there too to combine with your Joe Gambles who does all the nitty-gritty work. He's [Stuart Taylor] done very well to get the players he has.”

The absence of Rory Gaffney was notable at times, despite Craig Curran putting in a tireless performance. The lack of a goal cost Limerick what would have been an excellent three points, and perhaps Gaffney might have been the man to deliver for Limerick. Folan maintains that Rory is an asset and his return will improve the side.

“I haven't seen a lot of Rory. We used to play with each other growing up at Mervue, but from what I've heard, he was on fire last year. There was a few training sessions that he took part in and you can tell that whether Stuart wants to play one up top or two up top, he could adapt. It depends on how the game is, the formation, the opposition but when Rory gets back fit, he'll be a great addition as well as Dom Foley. We've got a stronger squad again when those two come back, but I'm sure Rory will be great when he finds his feet again. He's had a little setback, but I know he'll bounce back from it – I know the type of lad he is and what type of player he is and I'm sure he'll be fine.”

Cork City proved tough opposition for Limerick, who coped with the threat of Daryl Kavanagh very well before he was eventually substituted, but young Folan was quick to compliment on Cork City and Tommy Dunne on their philosophy.

“I thought they were good. They got the ball down and tried to pass it. Instead of just playing back to front, they went through the middle and it was impressive. Credit to them because they went about it the right way. The way both managers approached the game is a credit to the league.

“When you're in England and you hear people talking about this league, they underestimate it so much. I was just talking to Patrick Nzuzi today about it and he said he couldn't believe the standard of the game; it was so fast, end to end, and he said it reminded him of League One in England. When a lot of kids go over to England and don't get a look in and then go out on loan to the lower league teams where it's more physical than anything, I would recommend them to come here.

"If I had that chance again, I'd probably have come home and played in this league because of the high standard. Look at the three boys in the middle yesterday for Cork – they were fantastic. I think our three midfielders and their three midfielders pretty much cancelled each other out. I did think our three were good, but I though Cork's three were very good as well. It's a credit to the managers. I think we edged it on the possession and overall, we were the better team but a draw is a fair reflection.”

Despite the wicked weather conditions and the amount of cross-channel football clashing with the kick-off time at Thomond Park, the Limerick venue topped the attendance charts this weekend. Stephen Folan admits he was absolutely delighted with the turn out.

“I was impressed. When I used to go and watch Galway United, you'd be lucky if you got over five hundred people and it just shows that the support is there. If the results are there, the weather is right, we can get four to five thousand.”

“There was junior football on, hurling, gaelic football as well so there's a lot of factors there that could have gone against us, but the atmosphere definitely helped. Fair play to the Cork City fans too who brought a large amount of fans with them. It's a good thing for the league. Myself and the lads were talking about it today the league is only going to get better; the amount of players coming from abroad that want to come and play here is crazy. They see it as a great opportunity. People say there's not a lot of money in the game, but to be honest, a lot don't care about that. They just want to come and play. If you're playing in front of three-and-a-half thousand people every week, you're laughing. It's a dream come true for me to make my debut because there's been a lot of misfortune before so I'm glad to finally get that elusive debut.”

The Thomond Park surface, despite looking patchy in places, held up relatively well. A smooth surface is key to Limerick's footballing philosophy and Folan was glad the pitch improved over the course of the week.

“It was good, yeah. We trained on it Tuesday and you would have sworn it was a rugby pitch(!), but it held up well. The pitch is only going to get better as time goes by, but credit to the groundsmen who got it into shape because it wasn't great when we trained on it.”

Drogheda United are the next hurdle Limerick have to climb, but the twenty-one year old defender insists Limerick will stick to the same principles.

“We'll go out and play the same attractive football we did against Cork. I played in Drogheda when I was younger for Ireland. The pitch was very bobbly, and it's a tough place to go and get anything from, but it'd be good to test ourselves against who were the second best team in the league last season. The lads are looking forward to it now because we feel a lot of teams underestimated us at the start of the season, like Cork. Whoever was watching the game would have realised we're not going to be a walkover and you'll have to play some serious football to beat us.”