FORMER Clare manager Ger Loughnane praised Brian Lohan at the presentation of the All Ireland medals at the weekend, saying he had to deal with a number of “booby traps” put in his path within the county, after taking on the job.
The Feakle man praised Lohan for arresting a slide in Clare’s fortunes, praised Éire Óg for initiaiting a review of Clare GAA, and he also lauded current county board officials Kieran Keating and Deirdre Murphy.
Despite having managed the Banner to All Irelands in 1995 and 1997, he said that this years victory left him with “a feeling like I never had before.”
Loughane said that there had been an enormous outpouring of joy among Clare people this time, and he feels it is because of how dramatic the turnaround was in five years. “Why was there such an outpouring of joy after winning this All Ireland? It was equal to when Dalo went up to collect the cup, it was at least equal to that. Why was that? In my opinion, and I’m only one person, it goes back to 2019.”
He said that at that stage Clare teams at senior, minor and under 21 levels were all failing, and there was a danger Clare would end up like Offaly.
At this point he said the entry of Lohan instigated badly needed change. “One man stood up and said ‘I’m going to do something about this’. That’s often what it takes.”
Loughnane said he was intrigued by an interview Lohan had done with Marty Morrissey ahead of this year’s All Ireland. “The interview with Brian Lohan this year was the shortest I’ve ever seen. But it was also the most informative. It had two questions. The first one was ‘Brian, did you always want to be the Clare manager?’ Brian said ‘no…I was just a Clare supporter’. Marty was like a mouse that saw the cheese in the mousetrap but forgot about the trap. He said ‘Then, why did you want to become Clare manager?’ Brian said straight up ‘because I had to’. And that was it ‘because I had to’. Somebody had to do it.”
He said that Lohan had to overcome significant internal opposition to do the job he wanted to do. “Next thing Covid strikes, not alone Covid strikes, but along the road there was every kind of a booby trap set by our own crowd to try and stop him.”
However he said that Lohan had persisted and that 2021 was a turning point for Clare hurling, with the beginnings of reform off the pitch. “We had a review committee set up, not alone a review committee, but a review committee of the most highly qualified people you could imagine. When the Éire Óg club, and they deserve huge commendation, set up that committee and it went to the county board and it was passed by the county board that there would be a five year strategic plan for Clare; everything changed after that.”
He said the strength of the review committee meant its recommendations couldn’t be ignored. “It would have been fobbed off except for the quality of people involved.”
Around the same time Lohan made a complaint, subsequently upheld by the Press Council and Press Ombudsman, about an article published in the Irish Independent, and Loughnane said this was a strong signal. “That was a huge turning point. It said that you’re not going to walk all over Brian Lohan and this new management that are in Clare.”
New faces were arriving on the county board and he said things were starting to come together. “The Review Committee had 241 recommendations as to how things were going in Clare. That Caherlohan wasn’t fit for purpose, that the Governance was absolutely disastrous and everything had to change. Central to that was Kieran Keating down there, becoming chairman of Clare County Board. From then on we began to motor.
“The following year Deirdre came in and the pace at which they have brought about reform in Clare GAA has brought us from an era of mediocrity to being at the forefront of what’s going on now at county board level.”
On the field, he said Lohan’s switching of John Conlon and Diarmuid Ryan from attack to defence was a great move. “Everybody that ever picked a team always said we have to have a good half back line and that was the first step to three years later winning the All Ireland.”
He said that Clare have already scaled Everest, but that in mountaineering K2 is actually a tougher challenge, and that the Munster championship is Clare hurling’s K2. “In my opinion the Munster championship for us is what K2 is to mountain climbers. Do you know that we have been in 31 Munster finals and only won six. One of those was a walkover against Kerry! Some of those we weren’t good enough, in others it’s just inexplicable how we lost.”
He implored the players to give it their all to end the wait for a first Munster title since 1999. “Mayo have been in 18 All Irelands and lost 15 we are the same way in Munster finals. Lads, if ye could win a Munster final…Look it, we all appreciate what ye have done, we idolise ye…. But if ye could win a Munster final…” he said to cheers from the attendance.
Owen Ryan has been a journalist with the Clare Champion since 2007, having previously worked with a number of other publications in Limerick, Cork and Galway. His first book will be published in December 2024.