Leitrim achieved promotion to Division 3 yesterday after a 0-15 to 0-9 win over Tipperary at Avant Money Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada. It's a great achievement for the Ridge County and manager Andy Moran as they achieve promotion back to Division 3 for the first time since their relegation in 2020.
Leitrim now go on to the Division 4 final at Croke Park on Saturday where they face Laois. There have been calls during the week to scrap the league finals entirely as it would give teams in the finals more time to prepare for Championship. Andy Moran had a lot to say on RTÉ Radio's Sunday Sport after his side's win yesterday and the calls for scrapping the league finals.
We're going to Division 3 and I heard a lot of noise during the week about killing league finals; they can kill them all they want for Divisions 1 and 2 but they won't be killing them for Divisions 3 and 4. Páirc Seán at the end of the game was amazing; it was emotional.
Leitrim is a football-mad county and to bring them people to Croke Park, well it's going to be an amazing day. The week is going to be green and yellow around Carrick-on-Shannon and all the towns around Leitrim.
Leitrim's Rebuild After Last Year's Disappointment
The League finals are a great event for the smaller counties who don't get to experience playing for something at Croke Park often. The final next week will be the culmination of nearly three years of work for Moran and his squad, who have had to rebuild and deal with the challenges Covid imposed on them. Next week's final also comes less than 12 months after Leitrim's infamous loss to New York in the Connacht Championship, a low point for Moran and his squad.
However Andy Moran praised his squad for coming back after last year's defeat and working hard to get back to a level where they're now one game away now from winning a league title.
Covid was really hard on the smaller counties; they didn't have the resources in terms of the strength and conditioning, physical work, and all that. The last three years we have been building. Obviously we lost to New York famously last year which got a lot of headlines.
The key things is that the lads stuck at it and they didn't shy away from it; they kept up the work during last year's club championship, kept lifting weights, kept doing the strength and conditioning. It really has paid off for us.
The league final next week is going to be an emotional even for Leitrim and they have a chance to win their first trophy since the 2014 Connacht FBD League title.
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