‘Could've been worse' - St Patrick's Athletic striker on Golden Boot race blow

Irish Daily Mirror

15-05-2025

Aidan Keena fancies his chances of winning this season's Golden Boot - because his rivals failed to take advantage of his six-week injury absence.
Considering he missed so many games with a hamstring injury, the St Patrick's Athletic striker reckons he is doing well to be just three goals behind leading scorer Moses Dyer.
The Galway United man is on eight goals for the campaign and his heroics have earned him the SSE Airtricity/SWI Player of the Month award for March.
But having scored his five goals to date in just his first four appearances of the campaign, Keena says he is still very much in the mix for the personal honour.
He was asked if he had his eye on the top scorer prize and replied: 'Kind of yeah, but at the same time if you're giving them six weeks, you're going to have to catch up, know what I mean, I have to get myself going again.
'I know if I can get myself going, I can be top scorer, it's not really a pressure on myself. A couple of boys are flying at the moment, Moses Dyer is flying, everyone has their turn.
'I'm three behind, I'm drawing with a few. It's going alright. Could have been worse.'
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While team glory trumps individual honours, Keena says a successful pursuit of the Golden Boot will be a win-win.
'Yeah, because I hit my personal goals we're going to be close as a team. That's the way I look at it,' he said.
'Other boys might be different. But if I'm top scorer, that means I've scored a lot of goals and hopefully we've won a lot of games, know what I mean? That's the way I look at it.'
Keena missed almost two months as he recovered from a hamstring injury that he picked up in training shortly after a 3-0 win against Bohemians in mid-March.
He returned to action earlier this month against Galway United and provided an assist for Kian Leavy's opener. He acknowledged that his absence could have been much longer.
'Basically the way the t-junction is you either need an op or you don't,' he said.
'If you need an op, you're out for months - three or four months - but if you don't, you get lucky enough and you can be back in six weeks.
'It happened in training, a cross came in and I took a shot and the pain just shot straight up it. I was feeling good and then just blew up out of nowhere.'
While Pat's have lost their last two games, Keena is confident that they can return to winning ways and close the four-point gap to the top of the table.
'If you start winning a few games, you get that confidence and everyone gelling and then you can go on a little run,' he said.
'I think it's fair to say (that Pat's haven't hit the levels of late last year). We haven't. But I don't think any team has.
'I think because it's so tight and every team is close enough standard wise and ability wise that it is going to just that sort of league.
'One team is top one week and two weeks later, they're fourth. It's just the way it is at the moment.'