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Eimear Kelly of Clare in action against Dee Johnstone of Dublin during their Division1, Group 1 game at Cusack park. Photograph by John Kelly.

Kelly Has All Guns Blazing Ahead Of Nowlan Park Showdown With Kilkenny


EIMEAR Kelly was in tip-top form for Clare in their defeat of Offaly, landing 1-3 in a great display, and the Truagh-Clonlara forward will be hoping for more of the same in Nowlan Park this Sunday.

Clare will look to make it two from two against a strong Kilkenny team as part of a double header with round four of the National Hurling League and Kelly says the venue or the opposition hold no fears.

“We are all guns blazing for them, yeah. We’re really focussed on ourselves this year and really trying to work on things in training and getting them out onto the pitch during games then. If we execute them, the results will come. We have a bigger panel for selection than we had against Offaly, but we are still finding time to get game time into the younger players like Robyn Conway, Greta Hickey and Síofra ní Chonaill. To be able to see them in competitive games and to build their confidence is great as well.

“We need to start rising up to the challenges of the likes of Kilkenny and embracing that. We’re going to give it a good lash and we’ve nothing to lose. We have a good record against Kilkenny and especially in Nowlan Park, but they are a serious team and haven’t been competing in All-Ireland finals for no reason. They’ll be buzzing to impress new management too but we’re relishing the challenge,” Kelly confessed.

There have been many changes in the offseason for the camogie camp, but Kelly says the squad is settling down now and the newer members, or those that have re-joined the side, have brought with them plenty of cause for optimism.

Four debutantes featured against Offaly and Kelly believes the side are all the better for them.

“We were almost happier with how we performed overall throughout the game, rather than getting the bare result. Even compared to the things we were doing last year, there is a feel good factor in the cap after it. Especially with the tough conditions that the game was played in, we were still able to execute what we have been working very hard on in training. It was a lovely start to the league.

“One of the things that I am happy about is that before maybe we might have made excuses for ourselves in the sense that we didn’t have the Scariff-Ogonnelloe girls back as of yet or whatever excuse that might have been there. We had gotten the heads right the week before the Offaly game and really worked on that performance. Playing against the wind in the second half was a good test for us mentally and to keep Offaly scoreless with the wind at their backs was brilliant.

“You can say that we’re a young team or that we’re a team in transition or whatever, but we’re a team now and that’s the end of it. The younger girls have come in and put pressure on the rest of us. There’s a solid team of us there now and so far, the younger girls have laid down a marker and they don’t have any negative connotations about playing Cork or Kilkenny and that has helped us too,” Kelly said.

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