Emmet Malone On Soccer: The obvious delight in the voice of a Drogheda United player interviewed on radio on Saturday afternoon as he revealed that team members "hadn't had to put their hands in their pockets" while out on the town in the wake of their title-clinching victory the night before suggests that some things will never change in the League of Ireland.

The way in which Paul Doolin has overseen the development of the club's playing side during his four years involved is, however, further evidence of just how far some things have come in a very short space of time.

Doolin couldn't quite resist the temptation during post-match interviews to take a swipe at rivals who have suggested that his club has bought the league with the money spent on its squad this year.

Doolin talked about the gradual development of his team and the failure of some other managers to achieve success in spite of the large budgets given to them. Both sides have points for while United have certainly spent heavily in pursuit of their dream, their manager has clearly delivered.

Not for the first time on Friday night, Doolin recalled a time when he simply couldn't attract the country's leading players to United Park regardless of the wages offered. A club with no tradition of winning was a hard sell for those who saw the prospects of silverware as being far stronger elsewhere.

What he did instead was amass a young and fiercely competitive squad which he displayed a knack for getting the best out of while steadily making improvements. Having gotten to the stage where the team was good enough to win cups, the Dubliner added another tier of talent to the mix prior to the start of the current campaign.

The result was clear to see on Friday night as a Drogheda team that has taken a fair bit of stick for its style of play won an open and highly entertaining contest with Cork City thanks to strong - and positive - performances in every area of the pitch not to mention a cracking winner by the club's last latest recruit, Guy Bates. The victory also completed a fine double for a side that had successively retained the Setanta Cup by beating Linfield.

Where Drogheda go now, though, will be particularly interesting to see. Stuart Byrne spoke impressively afterwards about the need for everybody at the club to remain grounded as they look to build on their success domestically while attempting to make a serious impact in Europe.

Without taking anything away from their achievement this year, it seems likely that there will be stiffer competition for the league next year. To name just a few, St Patrick's Athletic will presumably add to an already strong squad and may be more consistent, Derry may bounce back from a difficult and disjointed campaign while Cork City have again shown the potential within their squad.

However, Drogheda appear to have gained a head start over their rivals in the race to succeed Shelbourne as the Irish game's pacemaker. The club's major backers at board level enthusiastically talk up its potential in terms of Drogheda's dramatic growth and increasing prosperity and clearly it benefits from a sense of identification amongst the local community that is often lacking in Dublin.

Still, it has some way to go, even assuming it gets its proposed new stadium built over the next couple of years, before, say, it could capitalise on a really attractive European draw the way the Tolka Park outfit did by moving the Deportivo La Coruna game to Lansdowne Road a few years back.

Byrne identified surpassing his former club's best performance in Europe as the target for United now and Doolin seems set to receive the necessary funding to strengthen his squad again. That the prize money received for winning the league is rather incidental to the owners was underlined by the fact that they promised around half of it to the players by way of bonuses.

The reward for even relatively modest success in Europe would dwarf the €225,000 or so earned at the weekend. If he can get the club to the point where it could claim even a small portion of that very considerable pie, it would enable Doolin to end any debate on the scale of his achievements.