O’Loughlin relieved at victory

RELIEF was evident in Ger O’Loughlin’s voice when he spoke to the media shortly after Sunday’s victory over Antrim at Casement Park.
The Clarecastle man acknowledged that his side was fortunate to secure this latest victory on a day when many of the players failed to produce their best form.
“We are very relieved to get the two points on a day when, if right was right, we should have been beaten by eight or nine,” according to O’Loughlin.
“What we have seen today shows that we need everybody on board, even at Division 2 level to be able to go out and get the results. Antrim had enough chances to have won that game. Speaking with the Antrim manager, Dinny Cahill, he said that he is only getting to know the players over the last eight or nine weeks and he has a lot of work to do but you could see their determination in the way they battled,” he added.
“That sort of performance would not do against the established teams. We were all over the shop at times today,” O’Loughlin added.
He conceded that Clare’s chances weren’t helped by “the injury to Darach Honan on top of all we were already missing because of injury. We performed so well for 20 minutes last week that you would never think it was Clare who were out there today. When you have so many injuries, you are going to find yourself in a battle and I had said to the lads that this would be a battle if we were without two or three and we ended up without six. Too many lads didn’t perform today. It was an opportunity for a few lads today but they didn’t take it and its back to the drawing board for them,” he said.
“From my point of view, I can only be fair to everybody and I just hope that they get a chance again because some of them didn’t perform today,” he said when referring to the overall performance on Sunday.
That said, the All-Ireland winning star from the ’90s team didn’t hide his delight at the fact that Clare are unbeaten thus far in the campaign. “We targeted three wins from the games against Laois, Wexford and Antrim and we took five of the six points on offer and overall, we have to be happy with that but you can’t walk away today happy with that performance. That was going back to the bad days at times and I hope we learn quickly,” he commented.
O’Loughlin agreed that the decision to send off Fergal Lynch was harsh. “In fairness to Fergal, and I was right in front of the incident – he just followed through on the ball and there was no intent there and it was very harsh but sometimes referees go with the roar of the crowd,” he said.
According to O’Loughlin, the Clare players are working hard in training. “We are doing a lot of good things. We have five or six lads and they are playing too much and it is catching up a small bit now and we are only starting the season. It would make you ask if we are doing things right in Clare. We have no way around that and if they don’t get fair play, we will end up with injuries and tired bodies. At times today, you could see fellas struggling big-time. I just hope that we will get a good run now for the remaining matches in this campaign,” he concluded.
Meanwhile, Antrim manager Dinny Cahill expressed disappointment at not winning but said it was a big improvement from the Laois game. “We felt we didn’t perform against Laois. We watched the video of that game and we got out the tactics board. I felt our tactics worked well today. Our team is very young and this is a learning process for us,” the Tipperary man said.
“We got the chances but we didn’t take them and the name of the game is taking your chances. We can take a lot of heart from that game,” Cahill added.