By Shane Brophy
“Great start, very, very happy,” was how Tipperary manager Liam Cahill reflected on his sides win over Clare on Sunday.
“I’m delighted for the players. They've put in a massive effort over the last couple of months. They've really put themselves back up on the horse again throughout the national league.
“We came here really well prepared and delighted we got out of Ennis with a win. It was a tough assignment to start off with, great baptism for a couple of players, as well.”
He added: “This is what every manager is trying to build - a real team ethos in the squad. We have really genuine players in that dressing-room that really play for one another. If they are not selected, they'll pat the fella on the back that is playing in front of them and wish them well. That doesn't come around too easy. It is hard to create that. You need a group of genuine players to be able to create that. At the moment, thankfully, we have great players in that dressing-room, in that regard.”
Tipperary opened up a ten-point lead coming up to half time, but it was whittled back to four as Clare looked threatening every time they attacked, but the visitors were more controlled in the second half.
“The talk was about keep believing in ourselves,” Cahill said of the half time chat.
“We changed up a couple of things in relation to match-ups up front that were hurting us and spoke about trying to get that ball in quick into our inside forward line and keep the scoreboard ticking over and backing ourselves and trusting ourselves.
“We had a good bit of work put in, we’d spoken about that happening and we’re going to have to speak about it quite a bit throughout this championship where teams will come at us. It’s all about learning from that and practicing it and getting better at it. I’m really happy that we came through that bit of Clare pressure and hopefully it’ll stand us in good stead for what’s coming at us down the tracks.”
On the plus side, 5-22 was impressive scoring in the cauldron that is Cusack Park as the characteristic of Cahill teams in taking goal chances coming to the fore once more.
“When the opportunities arise you have to be able to convert them and we have the players that are good opportunists and like to put away a chance when created,” Cahill said.
“But also, from an entertainment point of view it is nice to have games with goals in it, spectators need that. While it is lovely to see players pick off points from seventy and eighty yards it can become a bit monotonous at times and for any young players aspiring to be good forward, today was a good spectacle for them to see the net ripple a couple of times.
“We practise it, I won’t say any different. We got into the twenty-point range today also, so we like to keep the scoreboard ticking over at the right time too. It is all about making good decisions, when (goals) are on and if they are on, we will take the score from far out.”
While 5-22 was impressive at one end, 3-23 was a lot to concede at the other particularly as Clare had chances for more goals with a save from Brian Hogan and a superb hook by Bryan O’Mara late on, so there is plenty to improve on going forward.
“100%,” Cahill agreed.
“Any time you give away three goals, they seemed to be coming from a little bit of indecisiveness from a defensive perspective. We’ll go back and look at it during the week to see where that play developed. The ball was probably lost up the field with a bad decision and then they hurt us at the back. Two of the goals in particular were aerial balls that should have been dealt with.”
He added: “We have an awful lot to learn from to take away from today. We have a lot to improve on and we wouldn’t be excited, while it’s great to come to Ennis any time and win, we won’t be getting too carried away with aspects of our play today.”
