BANNER’S HOPES RAISED
Clare desperate to get Reidy cleared to play Munster decider on appeal after red card looked harsh on TV
CLARE look set to appeal the straight red card issued to David Reidy by referee James Owens yesterday in the first half of their 0-26 to 0-15 victory over Limerick in round five of the Munster Championship.
Television replays suggested the dismissal was very harsh after the diminutive Clare forward collided with the physically imposing Diarmuid Byrnes to leave the Limerick defender on the ground.
Reidy himself was then struck with the butt of the hurley by Tom Condon, the Limerick defender also seeing red.
Given that James Owens didn’t see the initial incident himself and went on the word of umpires, Clare will be hopeful that Reidy will be cleared to play Cork in the Munster final on July 1.
Joint Clare manager Gerry O’Connor
felt it was a harsh red. ‘That’s what we’re hearing and that’s what was said to us at half time but the referees have a decision to make and look we’re not going to comment on any referee decision,’ O’Connor (left) said. ‘We’ll go through whatever process we have to go through to see if there was an actual injustice done there.’ He paid tribute to the Clare support for their part in this vital home win that saw them leapfrog Limerick in the final standings in the
five-team Munster group. ‘It’s a great feeling. We mentioned it all week, this is our fortress and our field and we really wanted to strengthen the connection we’d been making with our supporters since the Waterford game here. They were the 16th man. ‘At the start of the second half when Limerick started to come back on to us, they had the breeze, they had a lot of momentum but we were really composed and we were really deliberate in how we built the play through the lines and that was the key. We didn’t deviate from the game plan that we discussed at halftime. Build the play, don’t make heroes out of their halfback line, don’t bomb ball down on top of them and we felt that we would get opportunities and we did.’