*Shane Cahill. Photograph: Gerard O’Neill.
JOE Hayes is not a man to make excuses and while he agreed that the scoreboard flattered Kerry a tad, it’s what the final result.
By Mortimer Murphy
Speaking following Clare’s exit from the Munster minor football championship, he said, “Listen, it probably doesn’t (scoreboard reflecting the game), but at the same time, unfortunately, in the record books, it is going to be fourteen points. A bit of a sickener there with the goal, playing the last ten minutes with fourteen men.
“We were against the odds at that stage anyway. I thought we did very well for a long part of the game. I thought their bench made a huge impact. And maybe our bench didn’t make the same impact it made the previous seven days ago. But it is what it is now, I suppose. It probably is just a small bit of a sickener. Just a couple of points and the goal there at the end, just when our legs were probably gone and we’d run out of ideas,” the minor manager added.
Two missed goal chances in the first half were costly for Clare who were level with Kerry at the break in Tralee. “When you’re playing Kerry and Cork, you can’t be leaving goal chances behind you. We did, but listen that happens. We kind of said at half-time that this time last year, we went in leading. And within seven or eight minutes, we were about six or seven points down. So we just wanted to keep it tight for as long as we could.
“We hoped then that we’d find a few gaps and just kick away a few points. But listen it was a strong breeze, you won’t realise it until you’re out on the field. And probably our kicking game has probably gone a small bit delivering ball into Liam (Keane. And we had to bring him out to field to try and get on ball. So, yeah, it’s tough, tough going”.
Hayes acknowledged that Clare were unable to match Kerry’s strong finish. “I don’t know what to say about it. You’re like 40 minutes gone, eight all, 42 minutes gone, and four points down. What can you do? Listen, when they got going, I thought Stephen (O’Neill) did a very good job on Danny Murphy, I thought he did a good job. But he got tired and Danny Murphy’s a great player.
He probably clipped a good few points there at the end. But I thought Stephen manfully went at his task, as did all the boys. I thought Tristan (O’Loughlin) and Caelum (Killeen); I thought the defence was outstanding. I thought the full-back line were outstanding in fairness to them”.
Clare needed everyone at their disposal to upset Kerry, Joe said. “When you’re coming down against Kerry, you have to have a bit of luck and have all the things going in your favour. Darren Fitz was sick the last two days, couldn’t even travel. He was supposed to start. I know he was named number seventeen. He was supposed to start wing-back. Michael (Normoyle) had a recurrence of his ankle injury last week. He could only play 15, 20 minutes there. We’re probably not deep enough to do without a fit Michael and Darren Fitz”.
Player development remained the main focus for the ex Clare goalkeeper. “That’s the main goal, is to develop these lads, see how many we can get on to Clare U20 panels, Clare senior panels in the future. Life lessons, there’ll be some harsh life lessons now this year. Harsh life lessons against Cork, there’ll be some harsh life lessons today. And, you know, when the going gets tough, you really, really, really have to dig deep. You really have to. Listen, we dug deep, but maybe just our pockets weren’t deep enough, maybe”.
