Glenealy fail to hit the high notes in Leinster
Laffan says his side weren’t clinical enough
GARRY Laffan spent Sunday night at the opera mulling over the fact that Glenealy failed to hit the high notes against Portlaoise in their Leinster championship.
Laffan says it was his first time at such an event and probably the last time and Glenealy fans will be glad to know he was referring to the opera and not the provincial championship.
Danny Staunton’s late penalty heartache saw Glenealy fall at the first hurdle but Laffan admits that the blame lies at their own doorstep.
‘We gave ourselves a bit much to do. We made a lot of unforced errors at different stages of the game and we didn’t capitalise on our scoring chances either in the first half or the second half. We missed probably four goal chances and that’s not even counting the penalty so if you’re being harsh; you have to score those chances and that’s probably the most disappointing part of it.
‘I thought they (Portlaoise) got some great long-range scores and especially against the wind. They got some lovely scores. It’s very hard to judge it player-by-player at that level and the conditions that were in it (made it difficult too). With the amount of chances we created, we didn’t score a very high percentage.
‘Our work-rate was never in question but I just don’t think we were clinical enough. You need to be clinical to get these games over the line and when we look back on it that’s where we’ll have a few regrets.’
Defeat will hurt for now. Glenealy were treating the competition with the utmost respect and had no intention of exiting the train at the first stop but it was due to a lack of effort.
‘Once we won Wicklow, we took the Leinster challenge very seriously. We worked hard on it and we were nine points down at one stage and then a minute into injury time we got the penalty and if we had have scored that, I think we would have won it in the two minutes left. We’d have had all the momentum and they were struggling to get the ball past half-way. Another day, we get it over the line but it didn’t happen for us. The boys gave everything they had in the tank but on certain days; things will happen for you and on certain days; they won’t. That was one of the days where it didn’t happen for us.’
Laffan also has sympathy for Danny Staunton - a Glenealy warrior for many years who had the misfortune of missing the penalty but Laffan does not hold him responsible for a millisecond.
‘The way he put the first one away (there was no doubt). The conditions were just so bad. It’s just one of those things. On another day that ball would’ve been in the net. We would have gone on to win it because they were flapping but we weren’t clinical enough for that level. That’s the way it is.’