SHANE WALSH is loving football’s new rules after blowing Donegal away in Salthill.
Walsh starred as Galway romped home against the reigning Ulster champions – and kicked FOUR two-pointers as they raced into a 0-17 to 0-1 half time lead.
The wind caused chaos, and Galway took full advantage to all but kill the game at the break as Walsh fired over from outside the arc three times and once from a free.
Two-point scores from Mathhew Tierney, Rob Finnerty and stopper Conor Flaherty left Donegal with a mountain to climb, ending their three-game winning streak.
And Walsh was all smiles as his 0-11 haul fired them top of division 1 after four rounds, and says the new rules have given the game a new lease of life.
He said: “I love it. It is great. It is back to the skills of the game. You are seeing a lot more lads go one-on-one, seeing lads side-stepping and taking shots on.
“For me growing up that is what I believe football is all about and got you playing. That is why I love it. Keep feeding off that, because that is what we want to see.
“I think everyone was saying the last couple of years the game was getting so boring to watch. You didn’t really see the skills, just a lot of sideways stuff.
“Now you are really seeing the skills. I suppose some players are more comfortable than others but other players just have to adapt.
“The two point arc is obviously a great thing, it allows us to shoot more. Back in the years, it has been about percentage shots whereas now it is, have a go. We’ll take it.”
Galway were in complete control at the break as Donegal struggled to move the ball up the pitch against the gale and lacked intensity.
They clawed back some of the deficit thanks to Daire Ó Baoill’s doubles from outside the arc, but a comeback was never on the cards – even though the hosts went down to 14 on the stroke of half time.
Matthew Tierney was shown a straight red when he came in late on Hugh McFadden, and his dismissal meant Galway were allowed to keep two players in the Donegal half as opposed to three under the new rules.
That number was reduced to one when Daniel O’Flaherty was black carded 10 minutes after the restart for his late hit on Ciaran Thompson.
The visitors made a stab of it when Peadar Mogan got the ninth orange flag of the day but it was too little too late.
Galway defender Finian O Laoi was also black carded in the 63rd minute when he dragged Mark Curran to the ground, but Donegal failed to make their two-man advantage count.
Boss Jim McGuinness had no complaints about the result, but slammed the rules as “farcical” for taking the sting out of red and black cards ahead of their round 5 clash with Derry on Sunday.
He said: “Galway had a man sent off on two black cards and they had one man up and we had to leave three men back. That to me seems farcical.
“I don’t know what to say about that to be honest with you. That’s a non-intended consequence on the extreme side of things.
“But anyway, it made not one difference to the game that Galway had a man sent off and two black cards.
“It didn’t make a jot of a difference to the game because they were able to attack the way they were attacking up to that point. That’s definitely something that would certainly need to be looked at.
“The conditions were really, really challenging. We didn’t adapt as well as Galway did to it. Obviously Shane Walsh, I don’t know what many he finished with.
“But he did adapt very well to the conditions and had a couple of moments of brilliance as well into the breeze.
“That free kick with the left foot off the ground was a brilliant moment as well. So yeah, listen, good bit of learning for us today.”
GALWAY 0-21
DONEGAL 0-14
GALWAY: C Flaherty 0-2, 1tp; J McGrath, S Fitzgerald, D O’Flaherty 0-1; D McHugh, S Fitzgerald, L Silke 0-1; C Hernon, J Maher 0-1; C Sweeney, S O’Neill, C Darcy; R Finnerty 0-3, 1tpf, M Tierney 0-2, 1tp, S Walsh 0-11, 3 tp, 2f, 1tpf.
Subs: C Gleeson for Flaherty HT, F O Laoi for O’Neill 44, J Glynn for Fitzgerald 44, S Mulkerrin for Hernon 51, M Thompson for Finnerty 61,
DONEGAL: S Patton; M Curran, B McCole, P Mogan 0-2, 1tp; E McHugh, C McGonagle, C Moore; H McFadden, D Mac Giolla Bhríde; O Doherty, D Ó Baoill 0-6, 2tp, J Brennan, O Gallen 0-1, C O’Donnell 0-2, 1f, S O’Donnell 0-1.
Subs: E Ban Gallagher for E McHugh HT, C Thompson 0-2 for MacGiolla Bhride HT, N O’Donnell for Doherty HT, C McGuinness for Brennan 57, J McKelvey for McFadden 57
