*Clare’s Mark Rodgers. Photograph: Gerard O’Neill
CLARE’s leaders in the dressing room guided their recovery from the opening round defeat to Limerick to bounce back and overcome Cork by two points, forward Mark Rodgers revealed.
Travelling to Cork on Sunday, Clare knew they were “going to face a stiff challenge. Our first priority after the previous week’s loss was to get the bodies right. We are delighted to come out the right side of the result,” Mark said following Clare’s 3-26 3-24 win against Cork.
Even though Cork built up a seven point lead in the second half, Clare remained focused on the task at hand, the UL student outlined. “We like to think we are a resilient bunch, we just kept plugging away we kept doing all the things we have been training to do all year. We got a bit of luck, with a couple of goals”.
As the game swung Clare’s way they led by five points with goals from Rodgers, Shane O’Donnell and David Fitzgerald. He knew Cork were not going to roll over though, “all credit to Cork, they are a seriously competitive outfit. They were never out of it and we never died, it was a great game for the neutral. It’s back to the drawing board on Tuesday when we will look at the areas we feel didn’t go right”.
Puckouts from both Eibhear Quilligan and Patrick Collins were impacted by the wind in SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh but Rodgers paid little notice to the conditions. “The game was moving so fast I didn’t pay much heed to it. It probably took a bit off the puckouts at either side”.
Approaching the second round, Clare did not treat it as knockout but knew they had to win, the Scariff attacker said. “We never thought of it as a knockout, every game is so competitive. We have a win on the board now but at the end of the day a win won’t be enough to get out of the group and we know that. We probably came down here knowing we had to win and like every game, you want to win. I think we set out a good plan and we stuck to it and got the result”.
Influence of senior members of the squad came to the fore to bounce back from the disappointment of losing to Limerick, he explained. “Losing is never fun, we got back today. We have some great leaders in the dressing room and they guided us through the week. We were probably in a similar situation last year when we lost to Tipperary in the first round. We are just delighted to have the win on the board today”.
Getting a big crowd back in Ennis for the visit of Waterford to Cusack Park in three weeks is already whetting the appetite, he admitted. “We have a big came coming up next, it will be brilliant to be back in Ennis. We can’t wait to go and hopefully there will be a big crowd in Ennis, it was amazing to have the big support today, seven days after losing. Our supporters are brilliant and the roar today really drove us on when we needed it”.
He praised the squad’s S&C coach and nutritionist when asked on the impact to their bodies of two tough championship games. “We have trained all year for this. We knew we had these games six days apart. Obviously we never looked past the Limerick game. We are in really good shape, maybe there will be a physical toll for the next few days but we can’t wait to get back on the road again”.
