*Clare’s Darragh Burns celebrates. Photograph: Gerard O’Neill.
TRAILING by six points to Laois at half time in Saturday’s Allianz National Football League sixth round, Clare knew it was “win or bust” and they duly delivered.
A ten point turnaround saw Clare come back from five points down to win by four, their first away victory in Peter Keane’s tenure following defeats to Antrim and Sligo. The result means it all comes down to the final round to determine who will be promoted to Division 2 with Clare hosting league leaders Offaly on Sunday.
Clare coach Eoin Curtin said the second half display in their 2-22 1-21 win over Laois underlined what the Banner are capable of. “It was a super performance, the boys showed today what we know they are capable of, the energy, the pace, their handling, everything in that second half was as good as you could ask for”.
He was pleased with the manner in which Clare displayed an attacking brand of football. “That is what we know is inside of them and that is the way we want to play, we want to play attacking football and drive at teams, they did it in spades in the second half”.
Having gone 1-1 0-1 ahead after four minutes, Clare found themselves four points behind by the twenty third minute and six by the half-time whistle following the concession of Ronan Coffey’s goal. This second quarter fade was identified by Curtin as an area Clare must rectify, “That is something we definitely need to work on, while it is all smiles and laughs here we do know that we can’t go out of a game and not score for ten minutes at times, it happened in the first half and it happened in Sligo too, while it is all brilliant at the moment we do have things to work on”.
He added, “First half we weren’t happy with our performance, we had a lot to do, we spoke well and in fairness to the boys they backed up their words at half time, we got a tremendous second half”.
Energy that was lacking in their previous round defeat to Sligo was there in abundance for the second half, Eoin maintained. “We were so disappointed with how we performed up in Sligo, we didn’t bring the energy that we know is in the team, when it came down to it at half-time today we knew this was it, it was win or bust, they went at it, everybody wanted the ball, we were fighting for the ball around the middle of the field and the subs every one of them made an impact when they came on”.
With a return of 1-15 in the second half, the Miltown Malbay clubman said it underlined the spirit of the squad. “Our backs were to the wall, we fought really hard and showed great character and spirit, it was win or bust”. He added, “It was a massive swing, momentum is massive, momentum is huge in games, Brian (McNamara) was outstanding in midfield but Alan Sweeney won a kickout at one point which lifted everyone around him, every one made an impact when they came on”.
Welcoming Ronan Lanigan for his first appearance off the bench and Dermot Coughlan getting his first full half of football is a sign that the squad is getting stronger. “They are massive lads to get back into the squad, they have been chomping at the bit the last couple of weeks, I thought Dermot had a massive impact when he came on today and it’s super to have Ronan back and it adds competition for places to get onto the twenty six, we can’t wait for training on Tuesday and Thursday to see that bit of bite in the rest of the lads”.
Sunday’s final round is must-win for Clare and even then they will be relying on scoring difference given that matters are so tight in Division 3. “We’re back home again, hopefully we can keep our wins coming in Cusack Park, it was really nice to get a win on the road, it’s been a while for Clare football”.
“If we’re being realistic we’ve nothing achieved yet, we want to go up and we know we will have an almighty battle against Offaly next weekend, it is about getting the boys in, getting them refuelled, back to recovery and back to training Tuesday,” he concluded.
