This article is from page 70 of the 2011-07-05 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 70 JPG
CLARE TRAVELLED to Salthill expecting a Galway backlash but came away with severe whiplash after a 17 point beating. Little for Clare manager Ger O’Loughlin to do but swallow another frustratingly, disappointing defeat and ponder his own future as the Clare number one.
“We were totally exposed, the goals were killer punches and they took them very well. We were at sixes and sevens in the first twenty minutes playing into a strong breeze and again we were very naïve in a lot of the goals we are conceding but from our point of view, all we can do is try to go back, pick up the pieces and try to learn from it. The bottom line is we are actually scoring 20 or 21 points in most games but conceding three or four goals in every match and that’s something to try and see can we remedy somewhere along the way.
“It’s not easy and I think we are playing the best that’s available but we just need to get a bit more savvy about what we are doing at the back because we are just conceding goal after goal in every game and it’s costing us big time.
“In fairness to Galway, they were a class apart tonight and it probably shows the amount of work we have to do to get there. We were a lot better against Tipp but it was a different sort of game I suppose. Galway came at us from the start and we had done the same to Tipp. We were on the backfoot from the beginning and we never really recovered from it and that’s the bottom line really that we never really recovered from their early onslaught.”
And if the Clarecastle native felt that lady luck had deserted his side in the first half, Clare’s slim hopes of bridging the ten point half-time gap were soon dashed when they were reduced to 14 men after five minutes of the restart.
“We were chasing the game anyway once James [McInerney] was sent off but it was only eight or nine minutes into the second half and we were still hoping that we could perform a miracle but it was probably never going to happen. It just threw the game apart and we were completely gone then because they were just mopping up loose ball that came into their defence.
“I don’t have any qualms about tonight. We were outclassed on the night and it’s a learning process and another costly one for Clare but all we can do is be proud of the effort they put in for the year and hope that we will learn sooner rather than later. But it was a lovely evening for hurling so we can have no excuses.”
And yet perhaps the game could have hinged on the toss, such were the breezy conditions in Salthill that allowed Galway to build up confidence and a considerable early lead.
“The game could have been different. We were hoping we would win the toss but that didn’t even go for us tonight. They were always going to come at us early on and try to finish us off early and I suppose we had the rub of the green against Tipp when we won the toss and played with the breeze. It helped us settle and sometimes with young lads like we have on board, you need to settle for fifteen or twenty minutes to realise you can win a game.
“I think what happened tonight is that we were on the backfoot and they took their goals very well early on and we probably panicked a bit as well I think. A small bit of panic set in and we looked all over the place and it was very hard to actually fix the problems because there was so many problems.
“I have to admire the lads again because they tried awful hard and never gave up but we were just beaten and outclassed on the night with killer punches and as I say, we just have to learn from that in Clare because if we don’t, that’s going to be the case. But we are building slowly but surely.”
But would the Sparrow be willing to be the foreman for such a project going forward?
“I’ll tell you, it was the last thing in my head even, coming into the match tonight because I said to myself that it would be unfair to even think about that but I’ll have a very serious think about it because it’s like everything else, you give your heart and soul for the two years. When I went in, after a couple of weeks, I knew that we were starting off from a very low base with regard to experienced players and we have had to start from stratch but I think we have made progress even though the results are poor.
“ I think we actually have a nucleus built up to go forward but we need that injection again of five or six 18, 19 and 20 years olds over the next year or two. But Clare will win something I think in the next three years. It might take three years but I think they will win something.”
That silver lining seemed very far away on Saturday evening.