This article is from page 62 of the 2011-01-11 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 62 JPG
A BLOWTORCH to the cobwebs, a dash of new faces and more importantly a result to match as Clare eventually edged out their stubborn Cork opponents to get the season off to a positive start.
Twelve months earlier, in near identical circumstances, the same opponents had humbled the home side in what was Micheál McDermott’s first competitive outing as manager but this time, it was his new look Clare side that held the aces when it mattered most in the final quarter.
Granted, this was not a patch on the UCC side that went on to contest both the McGrath and Sigerson Cup finals last year, with only four survivors from last year’s clash in Cooraclare as well as being without their Cork senior inter-county trio on Sunday.
However, that won’t concern Clare who crave as many competitive games as possible before they embark on another tilt at the Division 4 title as can be seen by their determined, hungry finish.
It wasn’t all plain sailing though as this evenly matched contest was in the balance throughout, with only a kick of the ball separating the sides at any stage of the contest. Indeed, Clare were slow to start, appearing to be suffering from an imbalance of strength and conditioning in the gym and a lack of actual football due to the collective ban on inter-county sides in November and December.
That early immobility gave UCC a window of opportunity to strike a decisive early blow as Clare seemed ragged and indisciplined. But while freetaker Daithi Casey converted three unanswered frees in the opening eight minutes, UCC were also guilty of spurning three glorious first half goal chances, two of which came in the first six minutes. Had they taken either, Clare’s McGrath Cup campaign might have been over before it had even started but a combination of goalkeeper Joe Hayes and relieving goal-line stops by Niall Whyte and Martin McMahon from Kevin O’Driscoll and Paul Honohan respectively kept Clare’s head above water.
Clare first strike at the posts came after eight minutes when Cathal O’Connor’s shot drifted wide but from the kick-out, a well worked move involving Conor Ryan, Martin McMahon and Alan Clohessy ended up with debutant David O’Brien who pointed from an acute angle.
A minute later Clare had doubled their tally when Gary Brennan found Rory Donnelly who broke a tackle and dissected the posts and suddenly it was Clare who appeared the more threatening side. Daithi Casey hit back with another free but Clare were beginning to dominate the midfield clashes and again it was Brennan who fed full-forward Timmy Ryan to reduce the deficit to only the minimum at 0-4 to 0-3 by the end of the first quarter.
For all UCC’s early threat, it was