McLaughlin admits the Reds didn’t play their normal game

LOUTH cornerback Shannen McLaughlin cleared her throat, took a deep breath and composed herself to speak but her eyes told another story. As they welled up, they told a story of All-Ireland heartbreak.

‘There’s not much to say. We’re absolutely devastated.’ she revealed.

‘Limerick came out all guns blazing and they worked harder than us on the day. The three first-half goals had us on the back foot right from the start and it was a hard challenge to come back from that. We had a bit of a purple patch at the start of the second-half but they scored another two and we weren’t going to come back from that.’

What comes with heartbreak is regret, McLaughlin felt her team just didn’t do themselves justice on the day

‘We worked so hard all year and we just didn’t play well on the day. That’s not the way we play, it’s not us and it’s hard to swallow.

‘If we had played the way we know we can play, we would have had no problems. As a team, and individually, we just didn’t perform to our best. There’s not much we can say.’

Upon swift reflection the Clan na Gael player was somehow able to look forward that maybe has something to do with the past season.

‘It wasn’t to be today but we have such a great panel. Every single one of the girls has been training since last November and we’ve worked so hard all year. Mícheál’s passing brought us closer together.

‘The girls are like my family now. I spend nearly every day with them so I can’t see everything splitting up. We just need to stay together, push on and hopefully win it next year.’