Like everyone, I have many annoying traits and over the years I have been accused of being somebody who sits too much on the fence, despite the fact that anyone who knows me well would be pretty clear on where I stand on most issues.
nother thing that slightly annoys some is that they feel I can be unnecessarily optimistic regardless of the circumstances when it comes to Wexford hurling.
It’s not something I will be apologising for, but I must accept that last weekend’s capitulation to a very able Clare team was not a good day for Wexford hurling.
It is important, however, that players, backroom team, and supporters galvanise over the next few weeks to ensure that one particularly bad day at the office doesn’t define our season.
A story goes that back in the very early ’90s Cork were giving Tipperary an awful mauling in front of a packed Thurles on a summer’s afternoon during the Tipp glory days under ‘Babs’ Keating.
In the half-time speech, the legendary Tipp manager was imploring his team to show pride in the jersey and turn around this humiliating scoreline against their greatest enemy.
Passions were high as the door was approached for the second-half and ‘Babs’ roared the question: “are we going to win?” to his troops.
Disappointed with the muted response, he stopped Joe Hayes (one of hurling’s great characters) and repeated the question. Joe turned and calmly replied, “I think if I was a betting man ‘Babs’ my money would be on Cork at this stage”.
We have all been in similar dressing-rooms at some point of our career and it’s not a nice place to be. I can imagine the Wexford dressing-room was similar on Sunday, and one positive was that this young team without several regulars came out, kept going, and lost the second 35 minutes by two points.
Players deserve credit for keeping going and chasing what at that point was a lost cause. Clare deserve a lot of credit also because some of their play in the first-half was breathtaking.
From Peter Duggan’s splitting of our defence after three minutes to the artistry of Conlon, Kelly, Reidy, Fitzgerald and my man of the match, Aidan McCarthy, their score of four goals and 17 points in 36 minutes or so was pure exhibition stuff.
They were in command in almost every area of the pitch, and it is hugely worrying how easily they picked us off.
We must learn, and learn quickly, if we are going to turn ourselves around over the next few weeks, and one area is to adapt our play if one particular style is not working.
Three goals came from short puck-out turnarounds (and this was not the ’keeper’s fault), but if our tactic is to go short and it is not working we need to have different options in our artillery.
Aidan McCarthy’s first goal came from a direct puck from their goalie and when the ball broke, bang and goal. It took about three seconds and wasn’t rocket science, but it reiterated for me that hurling is a simple game for the most part.
Most teams don’t press on the puck-out anymore, but this also caused us problems in that Clare, when possession was secured, moved the ball at their ease across the full-back line with time to then deliver a very precise ball to their forwards.
We also afforded them huge spaces in our defence, with balls hitting the corners and leaving our inside line very vulnerable. I would feel when some of our injured players return it will offer more structure which was missing last weekend.
When introducing new players I feel their opportunity to shine is better when you have the bulk of your team on the field, and in fairness to Darragh Egan and his backroom team they have been deprived of this option since the start of the year.
We don’t seem to have the strength in depth of some of our rivals and it is very easy to sit in the commentary box and tell the world what should be done. On the other hand however, it would be foolish to ignore the warning signals witnessed last week and not work on corrections going forward.
Shane Reck, Conor Foley, Cathal Dunbar, Rory Higgins and Conor Hearne had good afternoons on a day to forget.
In two weeks, we are down to two competitive games before championship. It will come quickly and at present the Leinster side of the draw is far more enticing than the hell’s kitchen that will kick off in Munster.
We can qualify but there is huge work ahead in settling on our best 15 and structuring ourselves for battles ahead.
Hopefully injuries will heal and we will look back on February 26 with a smile and as a positive (there’s that word again) but painful lesson that helped us prepare for the battles ahead.
But at present things are what they are, and Sunday was a bad day for Wexford hurling.
