Captain Harvey eyes back to back wins

TG4 ALL IRELAND LADIES INTERMEDIATE CHM'SHIP

Offaly 1-12 Clare 1-17

Venue: Clara, Offaly

Compiled by Derek Dormer

OFFALY

Frees for: 27 (13/14)

Wides: 6 (4/2)

Scores from play: 1-6

Top scorer: Roisin Cockram

(0-6 6f)

Spread of scorers: 6

Bookings: None

Own kickouts won: 12 from 23 (52%)

CLARE LADIES football captain, Caoimhe Harvey is fully focused on recording back to back wins in the TG4 All-Ireland intermediate championship.

CLARE

Frees for: 16 (9/7)

Wides: 5 (2/3)

Scores from play: 1-13

Top scorer: Fidelma Marrinan

(0-7 3f)

Spread of scorers: 8

Bookings: Fidelma Marrinan (39)

Own kickouts won: 12 from 19 (63%)

Wayne Freeman, Clare:

“I thought we were the better team by far, we gave them oxygen at times and I suppose that's why there was five in it in the end. We outplayed them for long periods but we were a bit sloppy with taking our goal chances. We carved them open on several occasions but just took the wrong options at times. But we still kicked 1-17 which is good scoring.

SCAN

“We responded extremely well when going down to fourteen players getting that goal. Sometimes space opens up when you are at a numerical disadvantage and it definitely motivates the players when being down to 14 so I was delighted with the response. We just need to improve our game management. We need to learn how to not engage in contact and maintain possession when we have a lead approaching the end of a match but we are still learning.”

Wayne Freeman’s charges began their championship campaign with a 1-17 1-12 win over Offaly in Clara on Sunday and welcome Wicklow to Cusack Park for the second round this coming Sunday.

Captain Caoimhe Harvey gave a wonderful player of the game performance in their five point win. She said their attention was firmly switched on beginning with a victory. “You come here for the three points and thankfully that's what we got today. In the group stages you have to get off to a good start and we have that vital first win on board. We try to improve all the time and that is all we can do. We just have to get better week on week until the round robin stage is over. If we can do that we will be ready for the knockout stages”.

Fidelma Marrinan’s sin-binning forced Clare to work harder, the West Clare Gaels clubwoman maintained. "Often teams come together when you go down to fourteen players and it's up to us as a team how we look at it. We knew we had to support Fidelma while she was off. We had to just mark up, increase our work rate. Credit to all the girls for the work they put in and we actually dominated for that spell. Sometimes missing a player you can gather more space and that's what we did. We nearly and probably should have had three