The Kerryman (South Kerry Edition)
Sheehy targets further improvement
KERRY manager Eddie Sheehy said that Cork’s two early goals in the second half were killer blows for his team. Prior to the goals Kerry held a three point lead, but the scores gave Cork the impetus to drive on.
“The two early goals in the second half killed us. The girls were in great form at half-time and we felt that we had it in us to do well in the second half. But, I suppose, we found it difficult to get back after that and we found it hard to cope with Cork’s running game. We turned over the ball an awful lot when we had good possession. It’s a tough blow but we will have to try and move on with the qualifiers coming up soon.”
Kerry were without ace attacker Louise Ní Mhuircheartaigh with the shoulder injury that she picked up in the semi-final victory over Waterford. Sheehy admitted that the Corca Dhuibhne girls experience was badly missed in attack, although he was confident that she will be back for the qualifiers.
“Louise was a big loss. We couldn’t take a chance with her though as she just wasn’t right. Even up to Thursday night we were thinking of playing her but it was just too big a chance to take.
“We cer- tainly missed her out there today though because we are largely an inexperienced team and she’s a top player. She will be fine for the qualifiers though, and she will be a big asset for us.”
Sheehy and his management team are less than two months in the hot seat. While he said that it’s a very short period of time to try and prepare a team, he still felt that they were a work in progress.
“We’ve been here seven weeks. We’ve worked on some of the stuff but we can’t do everything that we want to do in that time. We have another three weeks to get ready now.
“There was a lot of positive things out there today, especially in the first half. We have to stop giving away simple ball. Giving it away cheaply is killing us. But look, we just have to look at the first half and take the positives out of that.
“Cork are experienced, like I say we have a lot of young players on the team so going forward this kind of game will stand to them. I suppose you learn more in defeat that victory.
“The penalty decision in the second half might have thrown us a little bit, but look that’s part of the game.
“We will learn and move on.”