This article is from page 106 of the 2008-07-15 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 106 JPG
FEAR, rage and bitterness – long af- ter the battle of the Gaelic Grounds gave way to a night of nursing disap- pointed pints and stifling tears, the fight raged on in the darkest corners of the World Wide Web.
The scrapping in the stands may have been blue-on-blue action, but on the forums of An Fear Rua, Boards. ie and GaaBoards.ie the battle lines were drawn very much along the banks of the Shannon.
The day had started in friendly fashion; with a public poll on boards. ie predicting a narrow Tipperary win and some 30-year-old memories on An Fear Rua.
“T’m old enough to remember the Munster Final of 1978. There was a massive build-up,” said Clooney- QuinHead on An Fear Rua.
“Both sides were crammed with outstanding hurlers and everything pointed to a classic match. What oc- curred was a disappointing match, with a lot of niggle between players all over the field. I hope it wont be the same today,”
After the match however, the gloves came off with fans pointed at each
other and the Banner players.
“Our supposed big game _ play- ers were no where; Carmody, Grif- fin, Plunkett and Gilligan (lets face it, when the fat was in the fire he
couldn’t score from 40 yards),” said Kid Chocolate on An Fear Rua. “Only Colin and BOC and to a less- er degree Donnelan, Vaughan and O’Grady came out with reputations
intact…Frank Lohan has hurled bril- liantly for Clare for a long time but he is not a full back. He was caught against Limerick last year, Limerick this year and nearly Waterford and was very poor yesterday. It’s unfair to such a good hurler to have him end his career like this. We need a full back… Mike Mac showed a stub- born side by excluding Quinn and this cost Clare. We now have a centre back 1f Mac picks the right team.”
Meanwhile on boards.ie the con- sensus was that Clare had only them- selves to blame.
ml OIF: Vcmm sey uoay amd s(ommex: hoe Come UE hYARUYa Li their wasted chances. Not at all un- expected, I think the Biddy Early Curse is still having an effect,’ said AO STE
Greediness was singled out as an- other contributing factor.
“Clare beat themselves today with the six forwards displaying high lev- els of greediness,’ said CyberDave.
‘Any time one of the players got a chance within 90 yards from the goal they were looking to land the big ‘hero score’ in stead of using their heads an picking out a better placed forward inside, a lack of experience I suppose.
“They had something like 14 wides if they got even a third of them they would have had a better chance at the end. However, they will still be a ma- jor challenge for who ever they meet in the quarter-finals.”
There was even time for some two week old sour grapes from the Wa- terford faithful.
“TI think Clare have been made to look better then they actually are,” said Deise59. “Tipp were awesome at times today yeah, but 10 wides to 2 in the first half tells its own story.”
Last word to Clare poster Keano the Legend on boards.ie who summed up what many in the county are still feeling today.
“Tm still very disappointed by Clare’s performance. Always hard to take a defeat but yesterday was tough as I felt Clare had the potential to win the game,’ he said.
“Once again the poor shooting was the main factor. The management will have to look at their own per- formance. Tactical changes should have happened sooner. Oh well, its onto even tougher challenges ahead.”