This article is from page 93 of the 2009-11-24 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 93 JPG
“ANOTHER one bites the dust.” One of Queen’s signature tunes that could easily describe the significant number of teams who have fallen on Cratloe’s powerful sword. Despite the hurling season coming to an eventual end last weekend in Waterford the footballers have at least one more big day out after this stirring victory. “Tt’s absolutely wonderful,’ ex- claimed jubilant selector Ger Lawlor afterwards. “We showed great char- acter and heart out there. We fought hard and gave them nothing easy. I’m so pleased with this fantastic result.” And who would blame him? Crat- loe’s achievement of taking another scalp along their road to success can’t be underestimated. They were the better side overall and only for a brief period of wind aided domi-
nance for Rovers this game would have been long wrapped up before the final whistle.
“The start of the second-half saw them take some control and they started getting on top,’ admitted Lawlor, “however we responded per- fectly. We didn’t lie down and then Padraig Chaplin came on and took his goal well. Then a few minutes later and McGrath got our third. They say goals win matches and they certainly helped us today. They re- ally killed off their challenge in the end.”
His post match analysis was very accurate indeed. Chaplin’s and Mc- Grath’s goals in the final quarter se- cured progression into next week’s Munster final against Kerry champi- ons Spa. What an amazing bonus for the Munster Club of the Year. They were so close in reaching a similar
position with the hurlers but now the footballers have dealt with this sem1- final hurdle and only one more game stands in the way of yet another his- toric final success for Cratloe.
“What a great year we have had? And now we have a Munster final to look forward to next week. Hope- fully our much congested year will be rewarded then. It’s not going to be anyway easy of course. I don’t think a bad football team has ever come out of Kerry and I don’t next weekend we will come up against the first. With a bit of luck we will be cel- ebrating again this time next Sunday as well.”
That would definitely be the icing on the cake. For their efforts alone this year in both codes they deserve another piece of silverware. It could happen, because this Cratloe team doesn’t seem to entertain defeat.