*Cratloe’s Jamie Moylan. Photograph: Gerard O’Neill.
CRATLOE AND Ballyea face off in what is arguably the tie of the third round in the Clare SHC this Saturday in Sixmilebridge, a game that has been described as “win or bust” within the Cratloe camp.
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Big clashes between these two have commonplace over the last decade, while there is no silverware up for grabs on this occasion, the prize is championship survival.
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Cratloe manager, John O’Gorman outlined, “We know exactly where we are now as we’re staring down the barrel of a gun so we have to pick ourselves up now again and get over this disappointment quick and start focus on Ballyea. It’s win or bust now for us now, a straight shoot-out with Ballyea so we’re got to be ready for that”.
Conor Ryan (knee) is ruled out while Cathal McInerney (hamstring) has yet to feature in the championship for Cratloe’s hurlers.
Victorious by three points against Scariff in round one, Cratloe came out the wrong side of a 5-17 0-20 loss to Kilmaley two weeks ago. “It’s disappointing to be on the end of a result like that. We were a bit off and at the moment I just can’t put my finger on exactly why because I thought that from training during the week that they were the same as always. They were training well and seemed up for the game but that’s not how the game panned out,” O’Gorman said of the defeat.
He continued, “There was a good win there so we need to have more scores on the board in the first half really. We just couldn’t make the ball stick as much today up front so we needed a bit of a lead at half-time.
“They got five goals, four in the second half and that’s not like us normally. Conor Cleary caused us problems today and we found it difficult to handle him. We had Diarmuid [Ryan] dropping back for frees but in general play you don’t want to be tying him down at full-back either. Look, it wasn’t just Conor Cleary either, we just seemed to be second to the ball all over the field really today for whatever reason. They appeared to be winning the majority of the breaks and were hungrier to do so and hunger wins most matches”.
