Waterford FC held on for a massive three points at home to Dundalk on Friday night. The Blues had a two nil lead but were forced to desperately hold on to maximum points when the Lilywhites pulled one back.
Keith Long will be allowed back on the sidelines this Friday against St Patrick's Athletic after serving the final of his three match touchline ban.
Waterford assistant manager Matt Lawlor spoke to WLR Sport after the match.
He says every match is now a cup final until the end of the season.
"We talked about it before the game. It's a Cup Final. Three points is massive, however it came. I actually thought we performed really well. A bit hairy at the end, but we'll learn from that. And obviously with the run that we've kind of had since the summer break, we'll definitely, definitely take that."
Lawlor was pleased with the majority of the showing from the Blues against Dundalk.
"A really, really pleasing actual performance, and we'll learn from the last 10-12 minutes. Yeah, again, we've changed shape a little bit today. It doesn't always happen, but we've always wanted to control the ball in terms of switching play as many times as we can, to play forward, open up gaps and get in behind and create chances. We've got the best striker in the league in Podge, we have, so we have to get balls to supply, and we've probably lacked that in the last few weeks."
Reflecting on the performance of summer signing Sam Bellis, Lawlor said:
"Yeah, I thought he performed brilliantly. That's his first league start. I thought he was outstanding tonight. He's been chomping at the bit in training. Every single day his attitude has been spot-on, his application is spot-on, he's got proper, proper ability as well. You don't come through Man City's youth team, and youth system, without ability, and he showed that tonight."
The group has acknowledged the position they are in with the prospect of securing European football for 2025.
"Yeah, we've talked about it consistently, we're in this position. You get points on the board and you see what happens from there. So, for us, cup final after cup final after cup final, we've prepared well, even before the Sligo game. I'm not just saying this, we trained unbelievably well. This week, just gone, we've trained unbelievably well, and I'm looking for the same now for the next seven weeks and six games."
The Blues assistant manager says that getting winning matches can be a catalyst.
"Winning feeling is everything, that's what we're in it for. We talked about the Bohs game, 3-2, that win. So, for us, that feeling is everything that we do this game for. We'll carry on, we'll use it as a platform, and we'll build and build and build, hopefully."
The no.2 explained that the recent international break was important to setting the record straight.
"We were so disappointed post-Sligo, hence we've had two weeks on the training pitch, and we were absolutely delighted with the work that we did since. So, for us, it's been a real key bit to respond to that. I said in an interview that the Gaffer said, that it won't happen again, and we mean that from an application, attitude-wise, but tonight, I thought we showed everything that we are about."
Waterford left-back Ryan Burke also spoke to media post match, stating the result were earned.
"It was hard fought in the end. We knew they'd throw everything at us. We had to defend well in the last 15-20 minutes. I think overall we performed very well. We kept the ball really well in long spells of the game so overall I think we deserved it. 2-0 though, we always know it's a dangerous lead in football. The boys in the middle, we know that quality is so good on the ball, keeping the game ticking over and that's what we needed when we were 2-0 up. We needed to keep the ball, we can't let it turn into a basketball game, which we didn't, but obviously they got the goal and then it got a bit scrappy but the two boys in the middle of the pack were excellent."
Burke says the group are well aware of the threat posed by St Patrick's Athletic who the Blues face this Friday night.
"That game tonight, we needed to get back on track, we knew that but now all our focus goes to Pats next week, next Friday. It's going to be a really tough task. They're in really good form so we'll do our analysis on them and hopefully have a good week to try and go there and hopefully get another win."
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