That was a proper Championship game. I donât know what it looked like on TV for the neutrals but there was a serious intensity to it, a good atmosphere and it was tense. The quality may not always have been there but it was hard-fought, both sides made it difficult for each other and it was an intriguing contest throughout.
And it was good to get the win because we were definitely up against it.
We should have been further ahead at half-time to have a level of comfort in that game. We had the wind in the first half and Waterford were clearly struggling to create chances. They seemed to have the gameplan of trying to win the ball around half-forward and then recycle it back to a shooter. Problem was, into the wind, they were very difficult shots and I think we were largely happy for them to employ that tactic. They gave practically no ball inside to Dessie, he got one point from the one low ball into the corner that he got.
So all that went to plan. Weâve played against sweepers before, we know that itâs not always the prettiest breaking them down but you have to be patient and we slowly moved clear, and I think we went 8 points up after getting the goal. There was definitely an element of fortune with the goal because TDB went down injured (absolutely sickened for him, poor fella) and he was kinda tracking Tom who won the ball and delivered it inside. Took a few goes but Flanagan got it over the line in the end.
At this point, it looked like we would stroll to a significant half-time advantage. Whenever we did get the ball inside, the inside trio had the better of their men. Were getting less joy at half-forward and midfield (other than Tom) but our backs were well on top and it didnât look like Waterford were going to create much. But then, we got very sloppy and gave away some really bad frees. Lazy, stupid fouls and it really looked like a case of taking the eye off the ball. Bennett was nailing them, he was playing well and it meant they outscored us 0-7 to 0-3 for the rest of the half with the wind in our favour. Which wasnât good enough and that could actually have been the losing of the game; that was the time to put the foot down and kill the game, we needed to keep their score down in the first half.
Liam Gordon and his officials did not have a good game. Obviously I didnât see the Flanagan one live, but that looked like a blatant red card. No complaints with the Hegarty one later. They allowed cynical off-the-ball dragdowns happen consistently and why wouldnât you do it if youâre not going to be punished? But very hard to have a free-flowing game in those circumstances. He also gave some very soft frees to both sides when ignoring other stuff. I think, after the red card, he gave us some very soft frees and disallowed a Waterford point when I think the foul occurred after the ball had already gone over the bar. But then, Flanagan was taken out off the ball when he would have picked up a loose ball to score a goal⊠he just had a bad game, there didnât seem to be consistency and seemed to lose control of the game. Iâd blame his linesmen as much as anyone though, the ref canât be expected to see anything and they didnât offer much help.
Waterford started the second half really well. Wind at their back, using the running game well, they notched a couple of quick scores. I thought we were in a bit of trouble. Then obviously we had the penalty (brilliant from Gillane again), and the red card followed pretty much after the save. At that point, I thought that if Waterford keep playing the way they are, they win the game. Limerick were already struggling a little bit on puckouts into the wind, we were now down Hegarty, one of our main targets (even though he wasnât playing well).
But instead, Waterford stopped playing the same way and resulted to launching the ball from midfield down on top of the Limerick backs. Absolute fucking madness. Firstly, itâs not making use of the extra man. And secondly, itâs what Limerick are really really good at defending. They just ate that up; Casey, Morrissey, Finn, Nash, they were all excellent in around that ball.
If Waterford moved the ball, ran at us from deep, made our forwards run around trying to get tackles in, they would have tired us out and won the game, I think. Davy got a lot of things right: not allowing Nash be the distributor from short puckouts, the match-ups across the half-forward line, the extra bodies at the breaks in midfield⊠all those were spot on. But that tactic was utterly mental and handed Limerick the victory.
Now, we still had to fight for it. Our own puckout into the wind was where we were struggling. There was no obvious option for the second ball on our short puckout, the wind meant that even Byrnes couldnât hit the full-forward line directly, Calum Lyons is an absolute monster under a high ball and our midfield werenât quite where they need to be.
Tom Morrissey pulled us through. Another immense performance for him, man of the match by a country mile. You know that when there is adversity, he will step up. Wins the dirty, hard ball, makes the right decisions and works his socks off every single day he goes out. A brilliant player and another superb performance from him. Nothing fancy, just does the basics right.
After the red card, Bennett missed the long-range free and then Darragh Lyons hit a wide. We then hit 4 points on the trot. Thatâs the winning of the game there. First one was a sensational score from Tom, brought it in from right to left after winning the breaking ball. Thatâs what leaders do. Waterford did have that disallowed point after Tomâs score which I feel was harsh but we did follow it up a brilliant point by Nash (this was an unbelievable off-the-ball run which took him to the opposite 21, cannot be overstated how well Nash did and was picked out by Lynch excellently). DOD then played a sensational crossfield ball to Gillane who took it cleanly first-time and over the bar off his right side, just after missing a bad free.
Then you had Bennett missing the handy free and taking out Byrnes late which gave us a handy score. He was frustrated obviously, but those kind of bad decisions are an absolute killer at this level. Whatever about the miss, donât give Limerick a handy score to go 6 points up. Limerick woke up after the red card, upped the intensity and the likes of Tom, Lynch, DOD, Nash, Finn made the right decisions in those minutes and Waterford made bad decisions. And that was the difference.
Waterford came back again, Patrick Fitzgerald looked lively when he came on. He would have caused us much more problems than the start than Kiely would have. Gleeson looked sharp when he came on, I thought. But that little period after the goal up to about 59/60 minutes won us the game.
Subs made an impact when they came on too, Reidy and Boylan particularly just got on a few balls when the legs out there were tiring. Reidy was involved in the goal chance which Gillane missed, which should have killed it off, but at least Byrnes got a point out of it. CON got a few tackles but also took on a wayward shot. Similar to Waterford in the first half, we struggled shooting into the breeze and Byrnes & Tom also had bad misses when we needed the carry the ball further up the field, I think. Obviously legs & minds were very tired at this point.
Overall, itâs a great match to win but loads to improve on.
Tom for me was man of the match. Gillane is a massive threat. Missed the penalty, the other goal chance and at least one free but, at the same time, he was still a brilliant outball and got some great scores. Casey was a real threat too and worked hard throughout.
Lynch was well-marshalled by Lyons but still had some moments of quality to open them up. Iâd have no fear of him tbh, if youâre getting that kind of man-marking attention, you can use that to create space elsewhere and he did that, but obviously with the red card, we needed him more involved because we no longer had a spare man. And he did step it up in the second half.
Hegartyâs red was fair stupid. Just an awful decision when youâre on a yellow. Iâd drop him for next week. He didnât play well, he got a few points but didnât work hard enough and CON is a serious option now. If he had got 10 tackles, hit 5 wides and got sent off, Iâd keep him on. But he didnât do the basics that he needs to do.
WOD & DOD struggled in the first half, DOD upped it a lot in the second half and burrowed out with a few balls when we needed him to. WOD struggled to get involved. Need him to up his game for next Saturday night because Ryan Taylor is a massive threat with his direct running and someone needs to track that.
Backs were largely good, Kyle didnât really get to go forward in the second half and his reaction times just seemed a little off. Having said that, he was in for a goal in the first half but Tom took a handy point. Also got a yellow card for being pulled down by Mikey Kiely. Refs/linesmen need to stop making those copout decisions- same thing happened in the Clare-Tipp game. Austin Gleeson got sent off for it last year, an absolute joke. If you donât see it, donât fucking embarrass yourself by guessing.
Clare had a bad day in Ennis, gave away some ridiculously soft goals. Youâd imagine that part at least will be sharpened up. They matched us last year and Tony Kelly always does well against us. We need to be way sharper, but maybe the kick up the hole will do us good because we could have put this game to bed in the first half if we had been a bit more focused, I think.
