Comerford: Switching Martin to centre-forward was decisive

O’LOUGHLIN GAELS manager Andy Comerford had little difficulty in pinpointing the moment yesterday’s Leinster club decider turned in their favour.

Comerford felt the 46th minute switch of his younger brother Martin to centre-forward and away from the clutches of Keith Rossiter and Paul Roche was instrumental in deciding the outcome.

He explained: “Martin was getting tied up inside, but in fairness to Keith Rossiter and to Paul Roche, they were hurling very well — in fact the whole full-back line for Oulart was outstanding. We moved Martin out and it worked, as it worked the last day against Ballyboden St. Enda’s. You need flexibility with the forwards, and thankfully we have that. We were finding it hard to get scores in the first half, and the first 10 minutes of the second half again was frustrating. But if you don’t shoot you don’t score, so we kept popping and popping and thankfully it came good.”

It had been a long wait for the Gaels, their second Leinster club title (they won again in 2003), but what should have been a tough task for the management team was made easier by the players attitude.

Comerford continued: “We had built up to three postponements, then Christmas came, and the fixture was made (for yesterday). We left them off for a two-week break but these lads — you couldn’t keep them away from the hurling field. They kept training away themselves. They’re like a good car, you just start them up and off they’ll go. We had a good challenge game against Kilkenny and we knew after that, they were singing the right tune.”

It sets the Gaels up nicely now for their semi-final next month. “It does definitely. The ring-rustiness was there in the first half today, and still there in the first 10 minutes of the second half. A match like that will bring us on a ton – we’ll just creep and creep along, that’s the way we are, after creeping now into an All-Ireland semi-final.”

For Oulart manager Liam Dunne there was no consolation.

“We came here to win and we didn’t. And it’s all about winning – people can talk all they like about the love of the game but the winners get everything, the losers get nothing. We prepared as best we could but it wasn’t enough, just lost out in the end. We can use the penalty miss as an excuse, but we were still a point up at half-time and went four points up in the second half. Being reduced to 14 men was hard and I felt it was a harsh decision as well. The linesman said he struck him, I don’t know. Maybe this team has to lose one to win one.”