Colm Collins: ‘This where you want to be – playing Kerry down in Killarney’

Hope springs eternal for Clare football and their ever upbeat and determined manager Colm Collins, writes Joe Ó Muircheartaigh

WHEN Sunday comes it will a landmark occasion for Colm Collins and his stewardship of Clare. A landmark in more ways than one, everyone of a saffron and blue hue hopes, as his side tries to slay the great dragons and create a bit of history.

It’s Collins’ 20th match in charge of Clare in championship in what is his fifth season on the bridge, which is already a record that surpasses the four-year sojourns of John Maughan and John O’Keeffe during the glory years of Clare football in the 1990s.

But what Collins et al want more than individual records or personal landmarks is what both Maughan and O’Keeffe enjoyed in those heady days. It’s the scalp of one of the big two in Munster like Maughan’s side claimed again Kerry in ’92 and O’Keeffe’s did unto Cork five years later.

As always it’s a monumental task, an impossible one if the lessons of history and the might of Kerry’s tradition are anything to go by, but for Clare it’s always the case of where there’s football, there’s hope. Plenty of it.

And that’s why as Clare make their way south on Sunday they’ll be armed with that hope that maybe, just maybe, they can send a few shockwaves through the football firmament.

“It is a great opportunity for us,” says Collins, “because if you’re playing football this is where you want to be – playing Kerry down in Killarney in the summer time. It’s a huge test for any team.”

For that test, Collins says that the only way to prepare is to trust in what has brought Clare this far — their stellar performances in the National League that saw them comfortably retain their Division 2 status and exploits in championships past being their yardstick.

“It’s just another game, that’s the way we approach every game,” he says.

“We get things right from our own side. We have our own thing going where we prepare for every game in the same way and it will be no different against Kerry.

“It’s not going to change. I know that the main thing about it is that against the better teams silly mistakes are going to be punished.

We’ve got to keep the ball and make sure we don’t turn it over easily and when the chances come to us we have to take them.”

There’s also the matter of Clare’s record against Kerry, with Collins homing in on the games in Cusack Park in 2014 and again last year as a measure of where his side needs to get to once more.

“All the games took on different lives of their own,” he reflects.

“I thought that the first year that we played Kerry [2014] their shooting efficiency was way higher than ours — they shot about 70 percent that day, while we shot just under 40. That’s just it, we had plenty of the ball and chances, but we just didn’t take them.

“There was the disaster of Killarney where we arrived late and the game was over before it started really after we conceded two goals. Again in Croke Park in the All-Ireland quarter-final we made some silly mistakes and handed them goal chances.

“Last year we had a fantastic opportunity and it was there for us that day. The performance of James O’Donoghue was probably the difference between the two teams on the day. They have forwards of that quality that if you don’t really clamp down on them and keep it very tight they could destroy you,” he adds.

In last year’s game

Clare led by two points early in the second half, had the wind at their backs and were upa man after the sending off of Donnchadh Walsh’s in the 33rd minute and then opportunity knocked for Jamie Malone as he thundered through on goal.

The Corofin man did everything right, had Brian Kelly beaten in the Kerry goal only for his shot to come thundering back off the crossbar as the chance to go five clear was lost.

A year on, it’s to get back into the same position as they enjoyed in Cusack Park, only this time to push on.

“It’s vital that we put away our goal chances,” says Collins.

“It is something that has been bugging us all through our games. We are creating these great chances, but we are not putting them away. You might get away with that against teams that aren’t of that top quality, you will not get away with it against the top teams like Kerry. You have got to get all those chances.

“That shooting efficiency stat is all important. We’ve got to get up there and be shooting around that 6o to 70 percent and see where that takes us. Also the main thing that we will be stressing is that when we have the ball that we don’t be giving it away cheaply.

“Then when the shooting chances present themselves we have to take them. Make no mistake about it, Kerry are one of the top teams in the country and they’re up there on merit and the results speak for themselves.

“That’s just it. With teams like that, teams of their quality, if you make silly mistakes they will take advantage and will punish you all the time. All we can ask for from our point of view is that we perform – that’s the only thing that we want.

“If we can do that we’ll see where that takes us and I think we will be very close if we perform,” he adds.