Clare GAA Discussion - 2024 All Ireland Hurling Champions

This talk about Limerick not beating Clare over '70 mins' is absolutely silly stuff . They won that munster final and will get better and Clare have it all to do still. Clare played above themselves in that munster final and will struggle to reach the heights again. Yes Limerick are wary of Clare but we might not even get to play Limerick again if Kilkenny turn us over.

Yesterday burst the balloon abit yesterday and that is no bad thing in itself . They did well to steady the ship and they finished very strongly. Diarmuid Ryan scored 3 important points but by God he's as slow as a snail. And both him,McInerney and Hayes behind them need a lesson. They all want to play too much ball.. John Conlon for all the plaudits goes awol and offers zero protection for the fullbacks. Poor auld Cleary is usually on his own with 15 yards of space between him and his mates.

Thats the end of Tony Kelly on the frees . As we go deeper into the All Ireland series misses hurt more. You can't miss 3 in a row. And Duggan is only a 75% er aswell. But I'd leave Duggan on them if he starts . He holds up the ball but is no goal threat..ends up getting surrounded and drops the ball. He could do with a stint out on the wing I think just to give him room to breathe. While both himself and David Fitzgerald are big men it suits neither to get overly aggressive. They end up losing concentration and being narky with the ref. Limericks Flanagan and Hegarty are naturally aggressive. They thrive on it and play better. Fitzgerald and Duggan aren't the same types of men at all. Stick to being ball players. A vastly improved performance will be needed against the cats but as for meeting and beating Limerick again. It's pie in the sky going on yesterday's performance. We'd be pasted

Yeah I agree, its good to see these players coming back. I think Aron Shanagher can be a potential match winner for us off the bench if he is back on form. He has made huge impacts off the bench for us in the past.

In many ways, I think it suits him more being an bench player than a starter. Last year, with him being the lone out ball for us, teams would zone in on him and make sure they were they were picking up the breaks, taking him out of the game. I think him coming as a sub takes the attention off him as the opposition mostly focuses on Peter Duggan. It was similar in 2018 with him coming in alongside John Conlon, Shanagher was able to get those 1v1 opportunities in around the house. He has a great paw and the size/athleticism to cause teams problems like yesterday.

Good points, I suppose these would be my views:

• Freetaking: I think Duggan will take them. He is usually pretty good, but of course, its not ideal changing the freetaker at this time of the year. Duggan is the type of character that wouldn't feel pressure too much either, he comes across as quite a confident individual. In 2018 Duggan was shooting at about 85%, I'd probably take that in a fortnight. But there is no doubt, Kilkenny have an advantage, if not a match winning one.
• Goal threat: Yeah it hasn't been there in the last two games, but with subs like Shanagher and Meehan to come on, so we have some potential dangerous in this department going into the last 10 minutes.
• Full back line: Funnily enough, I think Lohan will start Hayes against Kilkenny. I think with Hayes these past 3 games, it's more concentration and focus that's leading to this drop in form. He is a class player when tuned in, we've seen that both this year and in past years for Clare. Hayes needs to show character now, and come back a better player. I think he will, but obviously that will be Lohan's call to make. With regards to the full back line defending in general, it looks exposed in the way there is alot of space in front. But it's the way we setup and play. John Conlon plays very much from the Ken McGrath school of centre back play, he pushes up on the centre forward and wants to dominate that position. Maybe Lohan may want John Conlon to drop off a bit to provide more cover to the full back line, but to be honest I don't see us changing tac now at this stage. I think it will be more the full back line will be working better on covering their men on the breaks and spoiling the ball out of danger.
• Goalie: Nothing we can do at this stage. Just hope he doesn't let in another howler. He has been reasonably solid in 4 of the 6 matches, so 66% chance lol. Not good enough but all we can do is hope he doesn't cost us the game.

I believe the statement is about the free taking advantage. If it is a game with lots of frees, TJ scores a high percentage of his. If we are changing between free takers, it could easily cost us 3-4 points which could cost Clare the game.

It's not unknown for Kelly to have an off day on frees. When he's on, he's fully on and he bounces back.

True on Kelly, that when he's "on" with the frees, he could land 100%. But you can't ignore that he missed some easy ones and was moved off them in the last two games now.

As noted, he doesn't take frees for the club and I don't think he did on the underage teams either. Whereas Duggan has generally always taken frees whatever team he's one. David Reid also a back-up option.

We even had David McInerney taking one long range free v Wexford, which went wide. Kilkenny have TJ Reid and Limerick have Gillane and Byrnes, who very rarely miss.

If Duggan wasn't needed for the frees, I think there might be talk about his place in the team. His markers have found a way to shackle him, and we did have Shanagher, Meehan and Rodgers all scoring off the bench the last day. I think Huw Lawlor would be well suited for Duggan, whereas he might struggle more against the likes of Meehan. Another option being to switch Shane O'Donnell with Duggan, but really I like how SOD is doing at half forward.

Ahead of the Wexford match I was wondering if Rodgers might be an option to start ahead of Galvin (Galvin being a great sub to bring in). But Galvin did score two massive points, and a time when we were really struggling.

And Shane Meehan's potential is just massive, plus his goal scoring ability (we struggle to score goals). The mind wanders back to the shock decision to start O'Donnell last minute in the 2013 All-Ireland, and the chaos it created

Pat Fitz has announced he intends to retire from his position on July 18th

https://twitter.com/ClareFM/status/1539632368897622016?t=SmzB5SLB3hYhIrPyPeSE4g&s=19

Well, the most important question is: do we need to change the title of this thread ?

What's the Clare away kit look like? If they lose the coin toss they've to change kit

The Clare away kit is all blue,

But neither game would need Clare to change jerseys as they don't clash..

Very much agreed the narrative around the successor to the Don needs to be a fresh face and not a Fitz puppet..

Surely even as a Limerick man you've watched Clare and Kilkenny on TV at some stage over the years.....in any event what in sweet Jesus are you raving on about.

Teams didn't change for league in 2021 don't think either has changed their kit drastically since.

on that note it was unusual Cork and Limerick wore their normal kits for the game on Easter Sunday but in the football encounter 2 weeks ago Limerick were in their away kit.