*Darragh Lohan comes out of defence with the sliotar.
CLARE’s full back-line felt the pressure “but responded well” in Walsh Park according to number three Darragh Lohan who believed Waterford for full credit for their eight point win.
For only the third time in his career, Lohan started at full-back in the senior championship for Clare. It was a busy station with Waterford keeping him, Conor Leen and Adam Hogan on their toes but the trio fared well over the course of seventy plus minutes on Sunday.
Darragh said, “we were under a bit of pressure in the first fifteen minutes but I thought we responded well. They probably got the rub of the green a little bit more that we did but they are full credit for their victory today”.
For Tony Kelly to join the list of missing personnel for Clare was a massive blow, the Shannon man said. “We were already down Diarmuid Ryan, Conor Cleary and Shane O’Donnell. Any day you lose any player is tough but losing four players of that calibre is particularly tough”.
Chris Mooney’s decision to pull Adam Hogan for a foul on Stephen Bennett was “a harsh penalty,” he maintained. “I wasn’t in the best position to see it but look we are not going to look for excuses, they were probably better than us today and full credit for their victory”.
Tipperary is the next task for Lohan and Clare. “We are facing a huge game against Tipperary he said “our concentration was always going to be on Tipperary from 4p.m. today. We are still in this championship, everyone knows how competitive the Munster championship is. There is no more than a puck of a ball between any of the five teams any year. There is going to more drama next week and when we play in two weeks time as well”.
He continued, “we will lick out wounds and get back into training. We will have two good weeks of training now and really look forward to Tipperary”.
“Home games are massive, it’s the same for us. When we are playing in Ennis we feel we have the edge there and I’m sure Waterford are the same. It’s a really tough place to come to and you saw that today, the Waterford fans were really fired up. Every game you play is tough, you’re doing everything you can for the week to get your mind right and your body right for another tough battle, that is exactly what we had and it’s the same for two weeks. Every battle at senior inter-county takes a lot out of you physically and mentally,” he concluded
