When Graham Coughlan said Waterford players had bought in completely to what he wanted to do on Monday afternoon, the manager made a point of highlighting Conan Noonan.

The 23-year-old admits that he’s had to adapt his game as Coughlan had made the Blues ‘a horrible team to play against.’ At Shamrock Rovers, Noonan was known as more of a ball player, who liked to find himself at the end of moves. These days, he is called upon to work hard, track back and generally just get stuck in.

When the Kildare native decided to leave Rovers for Waterford, he knew he would see a lot less of the ball. But he also feels he has become a better player since Coughlan came in and changed the outlook for a club anchored at the bottom of the Premier Division, having not won any of their opening 16 league games.

‘It’s a miracle we are still in the league, really. It’s madness,’ Noonan said. ‘We were 11 points behind Sligo going into May, so to finish seventh is just amazing. We couldn’t have dreamed it, but we fully deserve it. We have worked hard for it, and we just want to finish the job now.’

And Noonan puts the improvement down to Coughlan’s arrival at the club and altering the mood in the squad. ‘When he came in, he changed the tide and just got the group closer together,’ he said.

‘Graham has this clear identity of how he wants to play, and it has been so effective. We have only lost three or four games since he came in. It’s horrible football to play against. I wouldn’t want to play against us. We just get the ball in the box and keep piling on and piling on. You can’t help but believe in what you are doing.

‘Everyone’s bought into it. It may not be pretty, but it’s effective, and everyone is in it together. We’re a really good unit now, really disciplined, really honest, and we just get after teams.’

Noonan insists there’s no magic formula behind how Coughlan (left) has turned things around.

‘He just stripped things back and tried to get the players believing in themselves. He’s big on little details, like body language and that kind of thing.

‘We were conceding too many goals and not creating too much. It was just getting back to basics. He always tells us just to worry about ourselves, not the opposition.’

Noonan knows how much his game has changed in the past six months, but accepts it when looking at the bigger picture. Sacrificing his creative spark for the greater good, which may see the FAI Cup come down to Waterford for the first time in 46 years and secure European football next summer, a possibility that looked remote back in May.

‘I love to get on the ball, create chances and score goals. But that’s not my role now. I had to adapt and find a way to be effective in the team. I’ve played a number of different positions and roles, and it was just about being effective in them. As long as the team keep winning, I’ll do whatever I need to.’

When Noonan was signed by Waterford from Rovers, it came with the added pressure of being the club’s record signing, something that he never paid much heed to.

However, life’s a little different down on Suirside. The anonymity that can go with playing for a Dublin club is gone.

‘It is different [to Rovers]. People recognise you around the place, and that’s nice. There’s a real homely feel to the area, and it probably means a little bit more because you see people around and they let you know how happy they have been with the success. We have all kind of embraced it.

‘And to be fair to the fans, they have been amazing all year. They have stuck by us; they have never been nasty, even at the start of the season, and I think we’ve repaid them.

‘Hopefully, they can have an amazing day on Sunday, and we can go out and do the job.’