*Donie Garrihy. Photograph: Burren Eye Photography
CONCEDING A SECOND goal before half-time was “a killer” for Clare’s hopes of getting their Oscar Traynor campaign off to a winning start, manager Donie Garrihy has lamented.
Clare fell to a 2-1 loss on Wednesday in their first tie in Group A of the Oscar Traynor which returns for the first time since 2019.
Before a ball was kicked, Clare were dealt a blow with Avenue Utd trio Elias Kunz, Nnabuike Nneji and Witness Odirile missing the start of the contest due to car troubles. Both Elias and Nna had been earmarked to start and it forced the Clare management to rejig their starting eleven. “Their car broke down on the way, we asked the officials for ten minutes and they wouldn’t give it to us, the appointed time was the appointed time they said”.
Garrihy said, “We didn’t want to put Jack Ryan on at the start, he is a young fella, we wanted to put him on with thirty minutes to go not at the start when they are really strong and would be able to muscle him out of there, it’s tough going for young Jack and Liam Buckley the same, they were honest, we gave Jack thirty minutes and Liam thirty five minutes but it was the last thirty I wanted to give the young fellas when the big strong fellas from Limerick would be getting tired, they were really honest and so were the two Hanrahans from Moher Celtic, they did everything we asked them”.
James Fitzgerald’s goal on the stroke of half-time really hurt Clare’s chances, Donie felt. “It was a killer, we gave the ball away, we don’t want to be pointing the finger at anybody or offend anybody because anybody that comes here on a rotten dirty night and gives their all for Clare on a rotten dirty night we’re happy for them”.
While it appeared Clare may have had cause to be disgruntled with some refereeing decisions, the two-time Oscar Traynor winning manager didn’t feel the performance of the match official warranted criticism.
Of the sixteen players that featured over the ninety minutes for Clare, only John Mulready had prior experience of lining out in the Oscar Traynor. This was a fact the Sixmilebridge netminder made sure to remind those involved at their session in Frank Healy Park, “He told us that! He made it known at training too, he wasn’t in the door at training and he had told us, that’s grand, congratulations John”.
He added, “John Mulready got tested once in the second half, he made an excellent save but John is there to make excellent saves, that is what he is there to do, if John goes home without making a save he is disappointed. He made one good save in the second half. Honest endeavour gets you a long way.
To prepare for the opening round, Garrihy and his management ran an international style training camp which he was very pleased with. “We got a great response, everybody was there, they came and did it, we tailored it last night and the night before to suit the game tonight, we tailored the length of time we stayed at training, the weather didn’t suit us but we did walk-throughs, these guys are so fit and strong, it is a pity that Kevin Barry doesn’t realise Ireland out of the world cup because I think he is disappointed he didn’t get picked for Ireland”.
Next up for Clare is a home tie against Kerry which is scheduled to be played on Sunday November 19th at 2pm. “It’s on in a month’s time, it is on the weekend because you can’t expect them to travel midweek even though midweek is good because you don’t lose club games at the weekend. This thing of a long lead-in doesn’t suit me or the players, they want to get it played, we came down here to get a result and get a win if not take the draw, we didn’t get it and that was disappointing”.
