This article is from page 94 of the 2009-04-07 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 94 JPG
DON’T be fooled by the four goals.
True, there was plenty of goalmouth action and those four goals but you could easily draw a line under things Neuse
All because, this was a dreadfully poor spectacle — the bite you’d asso- ciate with a cup tie at this advanced stage of the competition was sadly missing. Instead it was a tepid affair served up by two teams that certainly didn’t show their best.
Not that Lifford really cared at the end of this excruciatingly boring 90 minutes — they were full value for the win and if anything should have won by more as they closed to within one more win of a first Clare Cup final appearance in 33 years.
Both sides were understrength, but the loss of Stephen Hickey and Shane Daniels to the Rock Rovers cause was more keenly felt than Declan McMahon and Gary McNaboe’s ab- sence for Lifford.
Daniels’ commanding presence was badly missed in the centre of the defence while their attack was some- thing akin to a blunt instrument in the absence of Hickey, who has been scoring goals for fun all season.
It rendered Rock a pale shadow of the team that won an historic first Clare Cup title last season and meant that Lifford didn’t have to over-ex- tend themselves to cruise into the ETS me celtie
They were on their way as early as the fifth minute when the combative Roberto Pinto bustled his way from the edge of the area to the byline before centering for Ryan Boyle to sidefoot home the lead goal from eight yards.
It was as if Lifford were expecting an easy day of it after that opening
strike, because they subsequently sat
back on the lead and let Rock Rovers
come at them for a lot of the half. They didn’t pay the price for this
lax attitude, but should have. Rock could have had two penalties before Roberto Pinto made it 2-0 in the 42nd minute. In the 20th minute a
Lifford handball in their own area was waved away by referee — ten minutes later Brian Fitzpatrick was clearly obstructed in the area.
This rough justice on Rock was compounded when a clever flick-on by David McCarthy put Roberto in the clear and he made no mistake when beating Leonard Keane from six yards.
Any hopes of a Rock comeback ended 13 seconds into the second half when Leonard Keane spilled David McCarthy 25-yard yard effort into his own net. Game over, but the champions did at least make it inter- esting when Ashley Glynn finally forced the ball over the Lifford line after a five double-save from Mike elerliy
That said in the closing 15 min- utes David McCarthy’s penalty was save by Keane, while Ryan Boyle sidefooted wide with the goal at his mercy.
The final whistle couldn’t come quick enough.