Derry hurlers seek improvement as Kildare arrive in Owenbeg

It's been a chastening couple of week for the understrength Oak Leafers after they were beaten by Down (19 points) and Kerry (20 points) following an opening weekend victory over Tyrone. They complete their mini tour of the three pre-season Division Two favourites with Saturday's visit of a Lilywhites side who defeated McGarvey's team in last year's championship decider in Croke Park and - as if to illustrate the size of Derry's task - defeated Kerry by 17 points only three weeks ago.

The Oak Leaf boss is realistic enough to know the challenge his team are facing, especially given the number of key injuries they've suffered, but he's still expecting a marked improvement from their performance in Tralee.

"I’d say Kildare are probably the the most athletic team in this division," explained the Lavey native, "They are big and strong, they're good with the ball as we found out in Croke Park last year. The big pitch at Owenbeg will suit them down to the ground.

"We have our work cut out for us but we have got to try, well, given the way the last two matches went, if we got a real performance against Kildare I think we’d be happy enough that we are moving in the right direction.

"We were very disappointed with our performance down in Kerry, it was just nowhere near the level."

McGarvey's squad has been beset with injuries this season and while the return of Slaughtneil's Ruairi O Mianain will be a major boost this weekend, he’s realistic enough to recognise Division Two has been a steep learning curve.

"That’s probably a fair remark," he replied when asked if they have had to be tailor their ambitions to date, "I don't think we've ever gone out with the thoughts of, as you said, we were going to blitz these teams, but we certainly felt that we would be more competitive.

"Granted the type of players we are missing plays into that, there's no doubt about that, but both those games (Down & Kerry) were over with 25 minutes to go. We were out of them before we had given ourselves a proper chance to fight for them and that was the disappointing thing for us.

"Look, it starts again at the weekend. We try to get a performance against Kildare and we build for Meath, build for Donegal and then we are into the Championship. It will all come about very quickly.

For a team which has earned a reputation for fighting to the end, it wasn't so much the Down or Kerry scorelines, as the manner in which Derry accepted their fate that irked the Oak Leaf boss and he challenged his players to address that against Kildare.

"It's something we would pride ourselves on, that when we play nobody works harder than us and, of course, some days when you go out and it just doesn't happen for you. That's fair enough but all the small things have got to be right," he added.

"Your attitude has got to be right, your body language has got to be right and probably when Kerry scored eight in a row or something like that, I don't think ours was good enough

"Those are the wee things we have to put right. I truly believe that once we get them right the performances and the results will come but it's hard work, you are playing against good teams."