The way the first division of the National League is generally referred to by followers of the game here, you'd imagine that any sane man would have to dragged kicking and screaming into it from the comforts of the top flight. Not so Stephen Kenny, though. For, at just 26, the former St Patrick's Athletic under-21 manager was persuaded to leave Inchicore for the top job at Longford Town. A case, at first glance, of deserting the Stadium of Light in order to venture into the valley of darkness.

To Kenny, however, the move has made perfect sense for, while he insists he was enjoying his time working under Pat Dolan at Richmond Park, the challenge he was offered by the Longford Board was enormous and one to which he will devote every ounce of his energy.

Longford, it's worth remembering were on the verge of being forced out of the league last summer and though that eventuality was avoided, the survival budget of the new board at the club meant that a few humiliations had to endured on the pitch as everybody peered through the fog, searching for the best route forward. Scoring just 12 goals in 27 games meant winning just twice. That, in turn, meant finishing bottom of the league for a second successive year. Four months on and Longford appear to be on the road to good health again. The board, under new chairman Michael Cox, has made steady progress on the financial side and Kenny has made dramatic leaps forward on the playing side. Just two senior players remain from last year's panel while a young and talented group has been assembled to replace them. At the weekend, Longford emerged as the unlikely winners of their League Cup group, four goals producing two wins and a draw from three games.

"It's been good so far but there's still a long way to go," says Kenny who, when asked about his targets reckons avoiding the necessity for re-election to the league again this season would be a very positive start.

"As long as progress was being made in other areas of the club that would be a good start for us," he adds.

"The board are demanding a lot from me, and they're right to, but I'm demanding a lot from them too, and the club as a whole needs to get a lot more professional."

The same, as it happens, could be said of most of the clubs in the first division (in the country for that matter) but on the pitch, at least, there does seem to have been some team strengthening going on at clubs throughout the division over the summer.

At Monaghan Billy Bagster has brought in several experienced players, most notably Joe Hanrahan, Eddie Van Boxtel and Ricky McEvoy, while Cobh Ramblers and St Francis have also added a lot of new faces.

Drogheda's purchase of Fergal Coleman underlined Martin Lawlor's determination to bring United straight back up at the first attempt and the club is rumoured to be about to add a couple of Shamrock Rovers players to the squad while for Galway, Athlone and Limerick the changes have been less wholesale with the general hope being that young squads can make a greater impression with another year's experience under their belts.

Home Farm Everton, under newly arrived manager Liam Brien, are one of several teams who look to be overly reliant on youths and, while Kenny insists that the widely held belief that you can't solely play your way to promotion holds true, there is a temptation to fancy a side like Kilkenny who, after last year's struggles, showed two seasons ago that can mix it up as required.

"We were actually perfectly happy to stick with the squad that we had last season," says City manager Alfie Hale, "and the only new lads that have come in were players who offered their services. We'd be hopeful that this team can get us back up but I think we learned last year that if you do get up, you can't bridge the gap between this and the higher level without money and experience."

Like all of his counterparts, Hale points to the extension of the campaign to 36 games this year as a major factor in the competition and one, he hopes, that will favour his own men. "It'll make the whole thing tougher, a lot longer and we'd be hoping that that will mean that our experience will come into play more."