Clare Set To Round Off National Camogie League Campaign

Clare will complete their National Camogie League campaign on Sunday when they host Dublin in Cusack Park at 11.45am.

It is a game of no consequence in terms of the league for Clare, as they are out of the running to make the knockout stages.

Manager Ger O’Connell says while that is disappointing, it is important to finish the campaign on a positive footing.

“It’s unfortunate that we are not in the running for the semi-finals, but Sunday is still a competitive game for us. It may not be as important as we had hoped but it still gives us a chance to look at a few more players on the panel and build that competition for places. It’s a new whole new structure in terms of the players and management so we were all getting to know each other during this campaign and bringing in a new way of playing so it is a work in progress. Hopefully every week we are in training, we will be improving and the same with matches so that’s the objective in the long run”.

Sunday will be Clare’s fourth game of the campaign, with losses against Kilkenny and Limerick coming either side of a gritty win over Offaly. O’Connell feels there is plenty to take from those games.

“You have your top two or three teams there every year, but then you have the teams in the middle like Clare, Limerick, Waterford, Tipperary, they’re all working really hard to close the gap and keep improving. We have to keep working hard and focus on improving the girls both individually and as a group, and that’s what we will be aiming to do. Looking at Sunday, Dublin are maybe in the same boat as us in terms of having new management in who are trying new things and coming up with new ideas. It doesn’t always work out overnight as you would hope it might, but you have to put in the work to get it right and find out what are the right and wrong things to do. It will be a close game as it always is between the two counties and I don’t see why that will be any different on Sunday” he predicted.

Clare played the majority of their campaign to date without seasoned players like Chloe Morey, Niamh O’Dea, Orlaith Duggan and Maire McGrath as they were absent through injury and travel. O’Connell is hopeful as they filter back into the squad, they will have to work hard to take the jersey off the players who are currently holding them.

He said: “Those girls that were missing through injury have been working really hard to get themselves back fit and that’s a process that wasn’t easy for them, but it did allow us to look at other players in the squad. The girls that were out are slowly coming back into the fold and they’ll get their chance too. Hopefully a few of them might be ready to play on Sunday and we will see more of the panel as the year progresses”.