This article is from page 99 of the 2008-05-20 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 99 JPG
IN CLARE football, you live and die by what happens in May.
A few days back, Frank Doherty rightly said that Sunday’s game is of huge significance for Clare. Win and the season stays alive, lose and the Tommy Murphy is around the corner.
For all the positive talk the Tommy Murphy has received over the past two days in the wake of Wicklow’s Leinster First Round win over Kil- dare – Wicklow won it last year – Clare are still right to target a possible meeting with Kerry in the Munster semi-final.
The secondary competition, in re- ality, won’t coax the commitment and concentration levels required after Waterford next week.So Clare, simply, must beat Waterford and the feeling here is that they will.
A lot will hinge on the availability of a handful of players but that has been Frank Doherty’s lot since the league began and though Clare lost to Limerick and Tipperary in two warm-up games over the past ten days, they had turned the corner in the league with four wins back-to- eee.
True, Offaly came to Ennis with promotion secured but they didn’t come to Ennis to lose. Wicklow had openly targeted Sunday’s Leinster Opener as their priority but in both those games, Clare showed deter-
mination that they hadn’t displayed throughout the league — with the exception of the opening quarter against Waterford in Dungarvan. Right now, captain Michael O’Shea is Clare’s biggest doubt for the game
having injured his calf in that Tip- perary challenge. Both he and Dar- ragh Kelly — who slightly damaged his hamstring – travelled to Wexford to undergo two separate days of three cryogenics sessions in a bid to ensure
fitness and Kelly should be avail- able.
On top of that, Niall Considine picked up a slight knock on his calf but he too should be available for SUTIOE NA
Laurence Healy returned from in- jury and took part in both those chal- lenge games, Ger Quinlan shouuld be fit but that 1s tempered with news that Colm Dillon and Timmy Ryan both absent with continuing problems.
Doherty once more put out the call to the football people of Clare to travel to the game on Sunday. That such a statement has to be made by the manager is telling in itself, but that’s the reality.
Sunday matters arguably more than any game Clare have played in the last five years. If the hangover from last May is to be quenched, Clare must win. If the application that they showed in the second half of the league presents itself on Sunday, then they will. Seven months of work needs to be transferred into some- thing tangible.