Off The Fence With Fergie O’Loughlin

Fergie O’Loughlin is back to preview the opening round of the 2019 Clare SHC

Championship time has rolled around again and each of the teams in the senior and intermediate championships will be looking forward to getting their campaigns underway.

The real priority this weekend will be for coaches to set their teams up for that first round and realising how important it is to win your first round game. It is going to be key and winning that means the pressure hurling is over somewhat and you can move almost into the safe-zone and set yourself up with a bit more freedom. I think a lot of coaches this weekend will try and set up defensively to stay in the game as long as they can and make sure they are not out of it at half-time. A lot teams will also be unsure as to where they are at because they have blown hot and cold in Clare Cup games and were missing players so the real form will not be known until the weekend is over.

There will have been a big scramble this week for the best referees to get games because a lot of clubs have fantastic free-takers. Ballyea have Niall Deasy and Tony Kelly, Clooney-Quin have Peter Duggan, Newmarket have Colin Ryan and the likes of Kilmaley have Cian Moloney and Mikey O’Malley and a good free-taker can be worth a huge amount to you if you get a referee who has a tendency to be blowing for soft ones. Teams like Ballyea will have been canvassing for a referee who is not very finicky because the likes of Peter Duggan will punish them from anything up to 80 yards. Ballyea like to tackle hard and go at the game so they won’t want someone who is too picky. It will be really interesting to see what referees get what games this weekend.

On that note, we are without two of the best referees in the county this year in Ambrose Heagney and Rory Hickey and that could cause serious trouble in the standard of refereeing. I would love to know what efforts were made to bring those two lads back into the scene again. Ambrose is still fit enough and good enough and Rory is without question one of the better referees in the county. Something that a lot of people will be looking at is the standard of refereeing again and how much work has been done off-season. Have they come together as a unit and who has coached them? Unless officials are operating at high level, there could be controversies as the year goes on.

Looking back on how things unfolded last year, you have to imagine that Cratloe are still sick in their bellies after being totally in control at half-time of the county final and even into the second-half with the breeze behind them. Missed chances and the soft goal handed to Martin O’Leary saw Ballyea take over so Cratloe will really feel it was a missed opportunity. This year they will be really focused on making sure that doesn’t happen again but the big question is how they can marry the football with the hurling? We saw at the start of last year they were really energetic and really clinical but at the end, they got leggy and tired and at the end of the county final the year had really caught up with them. If they can marry both and get the recovery periods managed when there are football weeks in particular, then they have a serious chance of coming back and winning the Canon Hamilton. You cannot take away the process of Ballyea last year either and teams are going to be looking again at who is going to mark Tony Kelly, and that begins with Clooney-Quin. 3-33 for Kelly last year with just a penalty goal not coming from play is phenomenal return from the middle of the field. Who will be deployed to mark him will be huge.

It is so hard to put titles back to back in Clare because there are four or five teams who are so close in terms of the personnel they have. Looking at the top sides who will be pushing for the Canon, each of those have at least five to six serious hurlers with the rest being your average club hurler. That means that all of those teams are clearly contenders so there is no one team who are likely to dominate for a period when it is so even among the top sides. That is why the Clare championship from year to year sees so many different teams coming out on top.

There are a few interesting aspects to watch out for in this weekend’s games. As I already mentioned, who will be deployed to pick up Tony Kelly and Peter Duggan in their game will be key. Another interesting one in that game will be who Ballyea decide to put on Fergal Lynch who is lining out at full-back. I think it is criminal playing Fergal in that position because he is such a good ball winner at the other side of the field. That is no disrespect to Fergal because he will give his all no matter where he is but he is maybe lacking that bit of pace so that will mean they need cover in front of him. The problem there is it will leave space outside around Ballyea can exploit.

James Carrig being over Crusheen when they take on Wolfe Tones will be intriguing too. James will know Wolfe Tones inside out and that will add an interesting element to a game that is really difficult to call. Getting the match ups right in games like that is vital so having that bit of insight into your opponents can be that small margin. Match ups will be vital in the Feakle v Newmarket game too. Who is deployed to pick up Colin Ryan will tell a lot and Oisin Donnellan will need watching from the Blues perspective. It is a similar story when Kilmaley and Eire Óg meet. Who is going to mark Shane O’Donnell and where is he going to play? It will be interesting to see what Eire Óg’s game plan is and what they do around their best players to get them into space where they can do damage. Teams will really need work on making sure they are set up to get their best players in right places to hurt the opposition while making sure the matchups are right.

In terms of who will come on top when all the dust has settled, I think it will boil down to four or five teams.

A lot will depend on which Clonlara shows up. Will that unity be there when they put that jersey over their heads or will it be a case of going back to the individualism? They are certainly contenders if they can get that attitude right. We know what they offer in terms of the personnel and the spread of talent they have but it is that sense of unity and doing it for each other that they have been missing in recent years. If they get that right, they are serious contenders.

Kilmaley are serious contenders but for them it will depend on the weather staying good and having the top of the ground stuff. They have lively, fast, intelligent hurlers but John Carmody will be praying for dry days in Cusack Park. They won’t want to be put down into Sixmilebridge or tighter venues. They will want to keep it as open as possible and they are real contenders.

Sixmilebridge will be always there but having Davy Fitz coming back into the scene probably puts a bit more pressure on them now. They have a few players back and they could well have Jamie Shanahan back after the first round and they will in the shake up too.

To me, the team to beat are Cratloe. If they can bring that enthusiasm and energy that we saw last year and sustain it, they will be there at the business end. They have been bitten by what happened last year  in terms of just getting that bit leggy and tired at the end, but if they can correct that, they have the talent to do it. If they can bring all that together, then they are my pick for the Canon Hamilton.