Rory Gallagher's delight at Derry win as he reveals Conor Glass was always set to play against Longford

And while Glass’ second half introduction during the eight point victory hogged most of the headlines, it was the excellent over all performance from Gallagher’s team that gave more cause for optimism ahead of a November 1st Ulster Championship clash with Armagh in Celtic Park.

“As soon as Conor let me know he was coming back he was going to be playing in this game,” smiled Gallagher after the 2-14 to 0-12 win.

“He has done an awful lot for Derry long before I became involved. He had a hard earned sporting career over in Australia and we are just delighted he’s back. He is very popular among the boys and I’m delighted to have him in the squad, it is very exciting for himself personally.

“Gaelic football is his passion. As much as Aussie Rules is a great career and I’m sure it’s a nice lifestyle, this is what he dreamt of all his life, playing for Derry and playing for Glen, Maghera.

“We played nice football and I’m just delighted to get the win. We’ve done well here at home, bar the slip up against Leitrim when we only got a draw, but we like playing here. I think the big thing today was it was great to get back playing football.

“We’ve only had three or four sessions with the full squad but it has been really good since we came back. Obviously there is a lot of new blood in there, a lot of players playing for the first time, certainly for the first time under ourselves, a lot of them making their debuts at senior level for Derry and that’s good.”

Derry managed the game impressively against Longford and Gallagher was delighted at the mature display. The win does keep alive Derry’s slim hopes of promotion but that’s not something Gallagher is putting any emphasis on at this point.

“Ah, no. The league is gone. We felt it was gone when we didn’t beat Cork,” explained the Derry manager, “We needed to beat Cork to keep that momentum going.

“We just wanted to come here and play well. Longford are a team I have come across myself in 2017 and 2018 and they are a good side. I know Derry have had a lot of trouble with them in the past and I thought we were much the better team.

“We never panicked. It is about having your best players available. At the start of the year we didn’t have Niall Loughlin, Paudie ‘Tad’ wasn’t fit, Chrissy was playing with an injury, Shane McGuigan hadn’t much training done. They are big players for us.

“We talked about the quality here and playing a more sensible game rather than forcing things at times. We scored 2-14 and we are probably disappointed we didn’t score 3-17 or 3-18.”

Saturday’s victory saw 12 different Derry scorers and Gallagher was delighted to see the weight taken off the shoulders of Shane McGuigan and Niall Loughlin.

“Football has moved on, it’s no longer one or two players who dominate the scoring. That would have been an issue for me, we didn’t have enough threats all over the pitch. Look, we are far from the finished article but we had ‘Tad’, Ciaran and Oisin all contributing from deep, Oisin contributing from deep, and that’s the way the game has gone.

“It’s a very fluid game now and if you expect corner-forwards to defend, you have to expect cornerbacks to score.”