Daly says learning curve must go on

THEY say you learn more in defeat than victory and, true to the old adage, Dublin’s second Leinster final loss to Kilkenny in three years yielded a pile of harsh lessons.

Learning from the masters may be another way of looking at it as Kilkenny showed their up and coming ambitious rivals how silverware, the serious sort that’s given out beneath the searing summer sun, is won.

“Lessons, lessons, lessons, we’re learning them the whole time,” admitted Dublin manager Anthony Daly.

“It’s a hard defeat to take but we had a great victory today with the minors, the U21s are in the Leinster final, we’re in the last six of the All-Ireland. We have a big day coming up in three weeks. That’ll be a big day in the season for us and we know it. We have to come out and respond now and that’s crucial.”

So where did it all go wrong? And what of the tipsters who reckoned Kilkenny’s high mileage would inevitably give way to Dublin’s young legs as the Allianz League final appeared to suggest?

“Ah look, a lot of people were writing the script all week — backlash from Kilkenny. Ya know, maybe that stuff gets inside fellas’ heads.

“We weren’t performing in the first-half and we just said to them at half-time, ‘go out and throw off the shackles, hurl, hunt in packs like you’ve been doing all year’. That just seemed a little bit absent from our play. Kilkenny did to us what we had been doing to teams all year.

“Sure, Kilkenny have been the template over the years to be fair to them. We were just very disappointed at half-time that we didn’t play with that abandon we’d been hurling with all year. That’s key for the next day. We have to get back to basics. Maybe the day got to us a little bit, I don’t know.

“Young Fennelly was very sharp for them early on. Peter Kelly had a great game for us but you know when Larkin gets a chance he’ll stitch as he did. Like I said, lessons.”

For Daly, the turning point came in the 58th minute when Paul Ryan’s goal for Dublin, which reduced their arrears to six points, was cancelled out within seconds by a Michael Rice goal. In scoring terms the goals cancelled out each other but, psychologically, Dublin were a spent force.

“We showed a couple of signs of trying to make a real go of it, you know, got it back to six.

“A ball is dropping in our half-forward line, lost it, ball down the field and that was it really. Kilkenny goal. Game over.

“They were very much tuned in and the influence of the guys that weren’t there in the league final was significant to be fair, those guys played big roles for them. We were down a few bodies as well and it didn’t help but no excuses. They were better than us on the day. They were more powerful.”

Daly took Joey Boland off after just 21 minutes but reckoned he should be fully over his shoulder problem for their All-Ireland quarter-final tie.

“Hopefully in three weeks time we’ll have a fresh Joey Boland back at 100%.

“Hopefully we’ll have the options. David Treacy is ahead of schdule with his recuperation and Liam Ryan will be back so that’s two forward options. Darragh Plunkett did well when he came on so we’ll look at our options and hopefully get the best 15 out there the next day.”