The higher the altitude the more difficult to breathe

It was former Clare captain Gary Brennan who put it best after the Roscommon game when he said the air was going to get a lot thinner from here on in as the championship really kicked to life from the quarter-final stage.

Gary knows. He was there and saw at first hand the difference between beating Roscommon in a final round Qualifier and taking on Kerry in an All-Ireland quarter-final in Croke Park. It was a quantum leap — in footballing terms, but also of the mind, body and spirit.

Gary was the man in Clare’s campaign that year as he was for so many years, but for the All-Ireland quarter-final Kerry put Kieran Donaghy out around the middle and it ensured that Eamonn Fitzmaurice’s side had a strong foothold in the area, and from there on it went.

Derry are no Kerry you might say, but maybe by the year’s end we’ll be saying that Kerry are no Derry, such is the progress that the Oak Leaf County has made under Rory Gallagher’s watch.

It’s a level of organisation and method that is like the Donegal circa 2011-2012 that Gallagher helped create with Jimmy McGuinness and he could now be operating it on a higher and different level with a Derry side that seems to be getting better with every game.

It’s a process that’s methodical and manufactured and one has made Derry the most improved team in Ireland and now after a whirlwind campaign has morphed them into genuine All-Ireland contenders.

Clare got caught in the eye of this Derry storm in Croke Park — a perfect storm when you consider that the two goals inside 13 minutes from Benny Heron and Conor Glass effectively decided the game, while any lingering hopes of a recovery that would have taken Lazarus off the curriculum was completely snuffed out when with Paul Cassidy rifled home the third in first-half injury time.

It was merciless as it was masterful, something that we were given a sneak preview of in the National League game between the sides in Cusack Park back in February — it wasn’t so much the football that day, but it was their manager. Just seeing him in action.

Rory Gallagher shares a famous name, but even in his pomp the legendary rocker from Ballyshannon, who was Ireland’s answer to Jimmy Hendrix, didn’t pull the strings or strain the vocal cords as much as his namesake from over the Donegal border into Fermanagh does.

We could see and hear this from the Cusack Park press box that day — Gallagher was only feet away from us and he never, ever stopped; he was talking and shouting for the 70 minutes, telling players where to go, where to kick it or punch it, who to kick it or punch it to and when to kick it.

The Derry players were puppets on Rory Gallagher’s long string that wrapped itself around Cusack Park as they won by nine; the hope Clare had on Saturday was that it wouldn’t transfer to Croke Park, that the lines of communication from the sideline to the pitch wouldn’t run as smoothly, would malfunction and into the gap would jump a Clare side still on the high from the heroics against Roscommon.

There was more — more hope for Clare. Maybe after beating Tyrone, Monaghan and Donegal that had harvested 12 of the last 13 Ulster titles between them, the Derry team coming to Croke Park would be sated, feted, fatted and fulfilled with their provincial heroics and wouldn’t have much more to give.

On the evidence of this, they’re only beginning.

It’s easy to be wise after the event, but the intent was there before the throw-in, with the ball-drills that Gallagher conducted. Rather than leave this chore to his coaching staff, of which there must be many, he took centre-stage himself, barking instructions as they went sprinting by.

It wasn’t so much the drill, because it was nothing that club teams the country over haven’t done for 30 years, but it was the pace at which it was being done — a pace that was mirrored in the way Derry then hit the ground running and set about winning this game early.

Clare didn’t help themselves though, because this game was history repeating itself, but on a much grander scale as the nine-point victory in the league was multiplied by five, even if it really felt much more than that.

Go back to Cusack Park again and that league game — remember how Clare had really rolled up their sleeves in the first half and fought valiantly to be only one adrift at the break, 0-6 to 0-5, before leveling matters immediately after the resumption with a booming effort from Darren O’Neill.

We had a ball game that should have gone to the wire — that we didn’t was because Derry never looked back after a poor kick-out was ruthlessly punished. Substitute Gareth McKinless intercepted and then set up Benny Heron for a 38th-minute goal. That was it really.

The beginning of the end here came with another poor kick-out in the ninth minute, which ended up with another Benny Heron goal that launched Derry into this game and was the first of many hammer blows inflicted on Clare over 70 painful minutes.

Those first-half goals killed Clare, and when you’re killed there’s no resurrection, only the painful realisation that what you continued to give to the game was never going to be good enough.
It was hard on the team, because they’ve given the small but committed band of supporters that follow their every kick so much in 2022.

And no sooner was it over than the platitudes of ‘they’re punching above their weight’ rent the air. They’re not punching above their weight, instead, they’re where they deserve to be on the back of a consistency that has never been seen in a Clare senior football team ever. They’re punching at level weights because of the work put in and the footballers they are.

They’re great ambassadors for football in the county, but with that comes the realization that was touched on by Gary Brennan when he said that the higher the altitude, the more difficult it is to breathe. Clare found out on Saturday that it was suffocating, but the most disappointing thing was that there was so much more in them.

This is what disappointed Colm Collins the most as he gathered a few thoughts for his post-match interview. “Even if it was only an under-12 team and you took them out and they didn’t perform, you’d be cheesed off afterwards,” he mused.

That said, a 14-point defeat in an All-Ireland quarter-final won’t be the end for the team, or for the manager. After nine years at the helm, it can’t end here.

Who wouldn’t want to man the line for Clare when the Dubs come to Cusack Park in the Springtime, or when Clare go to Parnell Park or Croke Park to play them?
Colm Collins will want that.

After all, he’s the man who has ensured that Clare are playing these teams with imposing pedigrees and not languishing in the backwaters of Division 4 country like the county was before he took over in last 2013.

To 2023 then. And, no more about it.

Because in football, or in any sport it always has to be onwards and upwards. Every time.