Ryan happy Limerick still in control of their own destiny

For TJ Ryan, it was all a bit déjà vu. Last year Limerick also started out with a must-win game down in Cork and ended up with a draw.

In other ways though this was a lot different. Not one of the Limerick attack that started in Croke Park last August played up front on Saturday night. Throw all that into the mix and he wasn’t unhappy, whatever about happy, with his lot.

“The second-half performance was encouraging. All around the pitch we won a lot of the battles. The disappointing thing was when we went ahead we’d like to have held on but everything is still in our hands, a bit like it was last year. I think there might be one or two more twists in this league yet. But we’re still in control of our destiny.”

I’d like to have won but at least we didn’t lose it.”

That they didn’t he can thank Gavin O’Mahony – and the Kilmallock club, which Ryan would. After only 26 minutes O’Mahony had already rifled over four points from play at a time when Limerick had only 1-6 on the board. Whenever a halfback or midfielder was breaking out with a ball he invariably showed deep to make himself an option, take it, pivot and swing it over.

“We weren’t winning ball inside which was making life a bit difficult for ourselves but that can happen. In fairness James Ryan came on, he dropped back a bit in the pocket and won a lot of ball. We were unfortunate enough during the week that Declan Hannon got injured with Mary I (Immaculate College), then David Breen got injured here on Thursday night. In fairness to those guys (that played up front) they were all thrown together in the finish but in the second half the guys battled really hard. That bit of aggression was there.”

Ryan also expects to see Seamus Dowling back next week, and possibly Hannon too.