Luke Dempsey says Carlow are going into tomorrow's Leinster SFC opener against Louth in an optimistic frame of mind, despite the fact that a number of the county's best players have refused to make themselves available. Insisting that he is in the Carlow job for the long haul, the Mullingar man said: "Over the last few months we have worked hard to get the lads committed to the cause, convincing them that if they work at it, it will pay off. So you can't leave it in mid-air." Dempsey believes there is an onus on him to make it as attractive as possible for Carlow players to the line out for their county. "You just have to keep working hard at making it appealing to play for Carlow, with good, organised, professional training. The set-up has to be right. And then, you have to get results. It's up to the manager to make sure everything is right," he added. "From mid-March to the present time, the lads have prepared as well as any group I've ever been with. They've really put their shoulders to the wheel." The former Westmeath and Longford manager, who is in his 'second coming' as Carlow boss, acknowledges that his side are heavy outsiders for tomorrow's game. "Louth are very strong and I would probably prefer to be playing Wicklow, Longford or even Wexford for that matter but there are no easy games in Leinster these days. "We'll be judged by our performance tomorrow. What I look for is for a player to play his best. For me at the moment it's performance-related rather than results. If we get the performances right consistently, the results will come." Tweet

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