With Larne Women now at the midway point of their first season in Premiership football we sat down with manager Donald Malomo-Paris to get his thoughts of the campaign so far.
Donald we’re about halfway through the season now, have you seen that there have been improvements from the beginning of the season?
Yes, the main thing with the team is, the first half of the season is over, which for me was an introduction into the Premiership. It was obviously a step up, but what pleases me with about our performance today was the progression, you see that week in week out, collectively and with each individual player. That’s the key thing.
If you looked at it at the weekend, we were missing three key players, so the girls that stepped into them positions did not put a foot wrong.
It was obviously a tough introduction to the league facing all the top Belfast sides, but just before the break, you saw some great performances by the team.
That first run of games was always going to be tough, but it’s an introduction to the league the team needed, there is no substitute for game time – you can think about it, you can watch videos, and look at the players, but until you step in and play against you won’t know what it is like. So those first run of tough games while not ideal but was important for us to understand where we were at.
Then we came to the point of where we are playing teams on our level, we’re able to deal with it. So now into the second half of the season, we’re looking for improvement. You saw that at the weekend, going from losing 7-0 to 5-1, on paper shows massive improvement.
I suppose a lot of girls could’ve dropped the heads, but they’ll pulled through them tough games you must be proud of them for sticking with it?
The first time we experienced that at Derry, we could’ve easily lost that or come away with a draw. We saw the shoots of that against Lisburn Ladies in the 3rd match, where we came away with a 5-2 loss, but it was in the dying minutes of the game we got a second goal in a penalty. The team’s heads have never dropped, it’s a massive credit to them. They stick together and today was the same.
As you said you’ve had your introduction to the Premiership quality we face, we’re now going into our second run of games against these teams, are you looking forward to those now to see what the girls have learnt?
Absolutely, even in our team talk on Sunday I said to them four months ago in April when we started the league, for the players, the backroom staff, and everyone involved at Larne Women, it was a new experience. But now I see us as established ourselves, it is no longer a new experience, we’re here. So, go out there, have self-belief, go compete.
It’s not an excuse but we’re looking at young players, if you look at our age profile we’ve probably got the youngest squad in the league, and these players can only get better with this experience in the league.
