AFTER 70 incident-filled minutes, Clare were furious with the refereeing of Shaun McLaughlin. Undoubtedly, the Donegal referee issued a few vexing decisions against Clare in their opening NFL Division 4 game but before highlighting his display, they should examine their own.
Of the two straight red and four yellow cards received by Clare players, only Cathal O’Connor was unlucky to be carded. Perhaps Gordon Kelly could have escaped with a yellow after clashing with Paul Brennan six minutes before half-time. The referee flashed red to the Clare captain after talking to his linesman, who must have seen the incident that was missed by most people in Carrick-on-Shannon, while Brennan was yellow carded. Clare needed everyone to remain on the field, especially the likes of the Miltown man, who has been playing inter-county football for long enough to know what you can and cannot get away with.
David Tubridy’s red card, five minutes into the second half, was even more clear-cut. He connected with the shins of Leitrim’s Paddy Maguire after the ball had gone. Again the linesman saw this and Tubridy, who started at centre-forward and scored Clare’s first two points, was red carded. Not renowned for indiscipline, the Doonbeg man couldn’t have hoped to avoid red in this instance.
This indiscipline is added to the fact that Clare turned possession over 12 times in the first half, retained just three of their own 13 second-half kick-outs and made a couple of unnecessary substitutions, as neither Martin McMahon or Niall White were struggling sufficiently to warrant being substituted. So perhaps the referee wasn’t solely to blame for Clare’s defeat.
Ironically, Clare played significantly better with 13 players than they had managed with 15. Down 0-6 to 0-4 at half-time, they played much of the second half with 12 men behind the ball, opting to run at Leitrim when they won back possession. This worked to such effect that Clare led 0-11 to 0-9 five minutes from full-time. With both teams’ shapes almost completely absent, Gary Brennan, Rory Donnelly and Alan Clohessy dropped deep and ran at the home county to excellent effect. Unfortunately, Clare couldn’t close out what would have been one of their best results, under the circumstances, for several league seasons.
Tubridy’s two first-half points were added to by Cathal O’Connor and Rory Donnelly. O’Connor broke a couple of attempted tackles to score his point, while Donnelly linked up with Gary Brennan and Niall Browne before landing his score. Following Kelly’s red card, Leitrim’s Daniel Beck was their spare man around the middle third, while Tubridy and Donnelly swapped positions in the half and full-forward line respectively. Wing-forward Niall Browne played very deep and worked hard in this role. While they didn’t kick a single second-half wide, Brennan twice, Diarmuid Daly, Tubridy and O’Connor shot a combined five first-half wides. Clare also missed a decent goal chance in the 21st minute when Timmy Ryan’s shot was saved by the legs of Leitrim’s Cathal McCrann. Brennan’s long delivery was broken to Ryan, who was one-on-one with the goalkeeper, by Alan Clohessy.
Early second-half points from Tubridy and Clohessy frees left the teams level at 0-6 each. Points from James Glancy and Cathal Beirne appeared to leave Leitrim in a position to pull away. They were now 0-8 to 0-6 and two men up, 14 minutes into the second half.
Donnelly kicked his second point before Shane Brennan equalised with an excellent effort. The move that led to that score started with Joe Hayes fielding a Leitrim 45’ at the opposite end. With Clare now moving very well, Shane McNeilis placed Clohessy to fire Clare a point up, before Adrian Croal levelled two minutes later.
Gary Brennan took a grip at this stage, first firing over a 47-yard free and then winning a free after a lengthy run. Clohessy pointed the dead ball and Clare led 0-11 to 0-9 a mere five minutes from time.
Unfortunately, that was as good as it got. With Leitrim piling forward and the Clare backs under severe pressure, Barry Duggan and Michael Foran conceded frees, pointed by Beirne. The best Clare could hope for at that stage was a draw but even that was snapped from them when Wayne McKeon kicked the winning score two minutes into injury time.
Two minutes later, Clohessy fired wide from about 40 yards, when off balance and under pressure. For most of the second half, Clare displayed admirable attitude and gave it everything. A couple of the referee’s calls did go against Clare but their first-half indiscipline, high concession of turnovers and inability to retain their own kick-outs wasn’t the referee’s doing.
Aside from conceding five frees that were scored and some that weren’t, the Clare defence stood up reasonably well. Laurence Healy, Barry Duggan and Niall White, even though he was taken off, were solid with the two corner-backs seeking to attack when the opportunity arose. Gary Brennan, back from an ankle injury, was the dominant midfielder on view, while Donnelly and Clohessy worked exceptionally hard all over the field. Shane Brennan scored a nice point when introduced but was starved of meaningful possession at full-forward.

Clare: Joe Hayes (Lissycasey); Lawrence Healy (Ennistymon), Barry Duggan (Cratloe), Niall White (Doora-Barefield); Martin McMahon (Kilmurry Ibrickane), Gordon Kelly (Miltown, captain), John Hayes (Kilrush); Gary Brennan (Clondegad), Cathal O’Connor (Coolmeen); Diarmuid Daly (Corofin), David Tubridy (Doonbeg), Niall Browne (Two Mile House, Kildare); Rory Donnelly (Cooraclare), Timmy Ryan (Kilmihil), Alan Clohessy (Liscannor).
Subs: Shane Brennan (Clondegad) for Timmy Ryan (38), Kevin Hartnett (Meelick) for Niall White (40), Michael Foran (O’Curry’s) for Diarmuid Daly (42) and Shane McNeilis (Kildysart) for Martin McMahon (52).
Scorers: Alan Clohessy (0-3, 2f), David Tubridy (0-3, 2f), Rory Donnelly (0-2), Cathal O’Connor, Gary Brennan (1f) and Shane Brennan (0-1) each.
Wides: 5; frees won: 31; 45s: 0
Yellow cards: Cathal O’Connor, Timmy Ryan, John Hayes and Diarmuid Daly.
Red cards: Gordon Kelly (29) and David Tubridy (40).

Leitrim: Cathal McCrann; Gary Reynolds, Ronan Gallagher, Paddy Maguire; Daniel Beck, Barry McWeeney, Barry Prior; Tomás Beirne, Wayne McKeon; Ray Mulvey, James Glancy (captain), Paul Brennan; Brian McDonald, Adrian Croal, Ray Cox.
Subs: Conor Beirne for Ray Cox (45), Colm Maguire for Ray Mulvey (52), Colm Clarke for Paul Brennan (57), Conor Sheridan for Colm Clarke (62) and Darren Sweeney for Brian McDonald (63).
Scorers: Adrian Croal (0-3), James Glancy (0-3, 1f), Conor Beirne (0-3f), Ray Mulvey, Ray Cox (1f) and Wayne McKeon (0-1) each.
Wides: 13; frees won: 34; 45s: 1
Yellow cards: Paul Brennan, Gary Reynolds, Tomás Beirne, Brian McDonald, Daniel Beck, James Glancy and Barry Prior.
Referee: Shaun McLaughlin (Donegal).

Two weeks to turn season around

THE next and possibly most revealing examination of Clare’s fabric won’t come this Saturday in Cusack Park. The Kilkenny footballers have yet to develop a habit of exposing the shortcomings of their opponents. Even London hammered them last Sunday, with Kilkenny only managing to score two points in Ruislip. So you can discount this weekend’s second NFL game. On Sunday, February 27, Clare travel to Carlow where anything other than a win will leave them demoralised and with no hope of climbing through the Division 4 hatch and into the division above.
What will influence their performance at the end of the month is the manner in which they deal with last Sunday’s defeat. If they allow it to fester, it may derail any chance they have of recovering and gaining some momentum. Therefore, the job of the three-man management team is not merely to devise a footballing strategy to beat the likes of Carlow. Of at least equal significance will be Clare’s mental readiness.
They will have to try to dwell on some of the positives from their defeat in Carrick-on-Shannon, while not omitting the negatives, most of which were self-inflicted. On the plus side, when they had just 13 men, Clare displayed impressive desire and a willingness to throw everything at Leitrim. Ironically, they didn’t look as eager when they had a full compliment of players. Ultimately though their dearth of numbers was much of the reason why Leitrim scored three points in the closing five minutes. Clare ran out of legs just as Leitrim were almost put away.
The red cards issued to Gordon Kelly and David Tubridy will have longer-term implications, as both will be suspended for at least a month. While their absence will afford an opportunity for a couple of other players to win a place in the starting 15, in reality Clare will be considerably weakened.
Hopefully Clare can work on improving several aspects of last weekend’s performance. Discipline is the obvious one, closely followed by a significant improvement on retaining kick-outs, winning a lot more breaking ball, not turning over possession as often and taking goal chances, even if only one or two present themselves.
If Clare don’t turn their season around over the next fortnight, the 2011 season could implode even at this early juncture. Realistically, their primary aim for the year must be to win promotion, put up a reasonable display against Cork in the Munster championship and maybe win a couple of qualifier games. But if Clare are still a Division 4 team in 12 months’ time, that would be a considerable blow to this group of players and their management. The next couple of weeks will be pivotal to an entire season’s work.