*Clare’s minor footballers. Photograph: James Downes
DESPITE SUCCESSIVE wins, Clare minor footballers still have it all to play for in the final round of phase one of the Munster championship.
Clare ran out 1-22 1-10 winners over Waterford in their second outing with Conor Burke accounting for 0-17 of this tally with a remarkable display. However, Limerick bouncing back to defeat Tipperary means both of those counties are on two points, a Limerick win over Waterford would push them to four points as would a Tipp victory against Clare.
It is certainly going to sharpen the minds for Clare according to minor manager, Joe Hayes. “Competitive games are what we want so there’s still a lot to play for in the last round against Tipperary. I mean Tipp are fighting for their lives now but despite two wins so are we as Limerick will be determined to beat Waterford in their own patch and if Tipp can overturn us, then all three teams will be on four points which would mean that scoring difference comes into play and no one wants that. So we have to go down to Tipp with a real focus and we’ll see what happens in two weeks time.”
Reflecting on Monday’s twelve point victory, he stated, “Job done in terms of winning the game which is great but you might suggest that after winning a game by twelve points why am I a bit subdued? I’m not disappointed with the result, it’s just that I think we got a small bit soft in the middle of the second half and that kind of irks me a small bit if I’m honest.
“Now in saying that these are 15, 16 and 17 year olds that are learning and developing all the time but we still have to be very wary all the time that with these new rules, you cannot afford to shut down, even for five minutes or you could get caught napping,” he added.
Waterford posed plenty of challenges in the second half, he maintained. “I was actually very impressed with Waterford in the second half, they gave us plenty to think about. Look, I don’t want to come across as sulking or anything like that as we’ve two wins from two so I’m absolutely delighted with that as this is an awful tough place to come to and it has been a long day but we do have some things to work on over the next two weeks.
“At the end of the day, minor level is all about development so how do you do that? You play your games and after those games, you say that we did loads of stuff right such as this, this and this but there are also loads of stuff that we can do better like this, this or this so I’m going in now to clap them on the back for the stuff that they did right but we also have aspects to work on,” he added.
Hayes told The Clare Echo, “I thought we did very well on both sets of kick-outs again, that’s two games in a row. And that won’t always happen as there will be a day when you won’t win all the kick-outs but that’s two in a row that we have dominated. Our scoring efficiency is okay but there have been lulls too. We let Limerick have a bit of a purple patch the last day and again today and I sup-pose every team will get their purple patch at some stage, we just need to limit what we concede in those periods. Conor [Burke] is an outstanding young fella and a real leader. His tackling and work-rate has even been upped from last year and to score 17 points in one game, he is just a phenomenal talent”.
