This article is from page 95 of the 2009-05-05 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 95 JPG
ANOTHER harsh lesson of life at the highest level on Friday evening as a powerful second half performance from defending champions Cork saw them cruise to another Munster fi- nal.
Having elected to play with the breeze in the first half, a spirited Clare could only get within two points of the All-Ireland champi- ons by the interval but the second half was a totally different story as Cork, now backed by the conditions hit seven unanswered points to finish in style. Only for a sterling perform- ance from Clare goalkeeper Denise Lynch, who repeatedly kept out a lively Cork forward line, it could
have been a lot worse for Clare in what was a real evaluation of their progress approaching the All-Ireland championship.
A Rachel Maloney free and an Eimear Dillon point settled Cork into their stride as early as the sec- ond minute before Clare got off the mark with a Roisin McMahon free after Ruth Kaiser was fouled.
McMahon had the home side level by the 6th minute but it was Cork who continued to dictate and they almost secured a goal when Eimear O’Sullivan burst through but Lynch was equal to the effort. That save seemed to inspire Clare who were now engaged in a real battle around the centre, with midfielders Brige Corkery and Deirdre Murphy in par-
ticular having a titanic personal bat- (or
After almost ten minutes of stale- mate, Cork finally shifted through the gears to grab five points in as many minutes to lead by O-7 to 0-2 by the 20th minute and although Clare did recover to score the final three points of the half through Roisin McMahon (2) and a great solo point from Laura /Diravat-batemmnssleaame-(eeemr-emmeye)epelmmoy-liale to try and hold Cork against the con- Ohta CeyIKy
In fact, for the opening ten minutes of the second half, Clare appeared to be coping admirably with a Shonagh Enright free canceling out Eimear Dillon’s earlier effort. However, once Cork opened up, they hit seven points without reply and even had a
number of shots on goal, only to find goakeeper Lynch in equally deter- mined mood.
In what was a tough and physi- cal tie, Clare will have learned a lot from their latest All-Ireland senior championship warm-up and with last year’s finalist Galway up first in six weeks time, Clare will now know the level they have to aspire to in order to make any inroads in this year’s championship.