Daly plays up the positives — for Clare

Anthony Daly has had so many great days and evenings in Cusack Park as Clare captain during the county’s celebrated golden age in the ’90s.

But on Saturday night it was the setting for one of his worst days as a manager. His bigger, stronger, more experienced and supposedly better Dublin team having their colours lowered by Clare’s bold young cubs.

“It wouldn’t have been the sort of excitement we’d be looking for but you have to take these things on the chin,” he said.

“Disappointed, obviously. We looked to be in a winning position and we didn’t seem to drive on for some reason. The Clare crowd played their part as well, it was a Cusack Park night.

“I’ve been lucky enough to be part of them at times but I was on the other end of it tonight. They lifted the players and fair play to them you couldn’t take it away from Clare, they all seemed to dig a bit deeper. They won great balls and they all did that little bit extra after being down to the 14 men. Hopefully now they can go on and build on that.

“They have fine young players. You saw some of them coming on there. I’ve just been in the dressing room there. They’re very young; our fellas aren’t too old but they’re a young team.”

Young, definitely, average age just over 22, but did we all underestimate Clare because of that?

“If you look at their year they haven’t done a whole pile wrong. Their main target was to get out of Division 1B and they’ve probably given Kilkenny one of the better games so far this year. I analysed the Waterford match, Clare probably should have won it really with the chances they had, the two goals that went against them and the chances they missed.

“They could be very easily have been in a Munster final and we could be somewhere like Dungarvan tonight. It’s a disappointing night for us but it’s a great night for Clare. Things are being done and they have a bright future.”

On his own situation, whether or not he would continue as Dublin manager, he wasn’t going to be making any rash decisions.

“I don’t know. When I took on the job I didn’t know whether it would be for one year or two years or what I’d be doing.

“I met the lads over in Killaloe four years ago and they asked would I have a go at it. Did I think there would be nights like this when there was 14 or 15,000 [actually 9,827] here in the Park with Dublin and Clare?

“When I was going there I wasn’t sure if that would be the case. I’d never make a decision like that on the night of a game. There’s no point, you’re all emotional. There’s plenty of time and anyway there is more than me involved.”

Nevertheless questions will be asked, legitimate questions, and even for Anthony himself there is no hiding the fact that having won the league last year this represents a massive setback for Dublin.

“It’s a very disappointing year overall. To be relegated, to be beaten in Leinster and then to lose a first-round qualifier — a very disappointing season.

“Maybe the hype of last year got to us a bit but I didn’t think that. I couldn’t have asked for any more of the lads in terms of effort and training, they couldn’t have given any more.”

As to what went wrong in this one, the DVD will answer that. For now he was more anxious to point to the positives — the positives for Clare that is.

“We seemed to get a lot of ball but in fairness to the likes of [Brendan] Bugler and Pat Donnellan they caught ball and stood tall. Obviously John Conlon is a very good player, fellas like that — Honan, Conor McGrath. These are as good a guys as what is in the country, if they get chances.

“Young Kelly stood up to the 21, first match and he stuck it in the back of the net. That’s a sign of the talent he is. We should have been mature enough to take our points and plug away but for some reason we weren’t and we say fair play to Clare.”