'Jekyll and Hyde' hurling must stop: Fitz

CLARE'S hurlers are still smarting from the criticism following the Tipperary defeat as they prepare to face Offaly in the qualifiers Saturday.

It may be seven years since the Banner last claimed a Munster title, but expectation levels were sufficiently high for supporters to vent their anger over the provincial semi-final defeat at the start of the month.

For veterans like Davy Fitzgerald, the sniping must be hard to take.

"It is annoying," he agrees.

"People will say you can never take away what you've done but, to me, that doesn't matter. I'm there to try to win for Clare. I know the sacrifices lads have made. It's unreal. The slating we got down in Clare after the Tipp game was fierce."

What grates most is the fact that, time and again, Tipp offered Clare a clear sight on Brendan Cummins' goal but not once was the invitation to punish such sloppiness accepted.

By the end of play, Clare found themselves adrift by two goals, Tipperary having found the rigging with the only pair of half-chances that came their way all day.

"Maybe we deserved it because we didn't perform on the day. It wasn't for want of trying but we didn't take our chances. Fair play to Tipperary, they got two chances on goal in the whole game and they took them. We got five and we converted none.

"We missed too many efforts from inside 40 yards. That's not good enough and we have to be critical of ourselves in that way. They're on about this team being old, that the years catch up on you but, to me, that's rubbish. I'm as fit as I ever was."

It's their consistent inconsistencies that are holding Clare back more than anything else. Time and again, they have clocked in with an impressive 35 or 45 minutes before going through the motions for the rest of the game.

The trend really began to emerge in the league final against Kilkenny when, after a promising opening half, Clare served up a second period of inertia on the way to a 14-point defeat.

"It happened for us in the first half and it's hard to know why it didn't happen in the second. It wasn't that they upped the gears, it was that we dropped them. The same thing has happened in the last three games, even against Dublin.

"We're getting goal chances and not converting them. When Kilkenny get goal chances, they'll convert them. That's it. Game, set and match. Goals make a difference."

With men like Fitzgerald, Brian Lohan and Sean McMahon still at the coal face, it's easy for the detractors to say that this team's time has passed. Beat Offaly on Saturday though and they're in an All-Ireland quarter-final.

"If anyone is being realistic they'll say, no, they're gone, they're finished. They're old guys, they're carrying some of the team, that's what everyone is saying, that we've no hope whatsoever," Fitzgerald admitted.

"Yet last year, when it was put up to us against Kilkenny, we weren't a hundred miles off them. My biggest problem at the moment is that we tend to be playing Jekyll and Hyde stuff. One day we're playing great stuff and the next day we don't know what the story is.

"We're finding it hard to work it out ourselves, how we find the medium to play like we can play.

"I believe that we're not that bad, I really do. There's a nice blend of a team there if we can put it together for 70 minutes."