'We never really got out of the blocks' - O'Keeffe laments slow Barrs start

TOUGH WATCH: St Finbarr's manager Paul O'Keeffe during the Cork County Senior Club Football Championship Final match between Nemo Rangers and St Finbarr's at Páirc Ui Chaoimh in Cork. Pic: Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile

St Finbarr’s manager Paul O’Keeffe has stood in the tunnel under Páirc Uí Chaoimh both in victory and defeat. As one of the game’s gentlemen, he takes to both ends of the emotional spectrum with the same grace. 

Despite his obvious disappointment on Sunday evening, he was realistic in his analysis of his side’s defeat at the hands of their Southside rivals from Nemo Rangers.

“Look, they were up for the game, you could see that they were hungry," he said. "I think that we never really got out of the blocks. We maybe did just for the last quarter when we started to really go at it and show a bit of character towards the end.

“But we’re really disappointed with our own performance. That was the thing that I feared going into the game, would we perform? I think we underperformed and that’s the story of the game really for us. We never really got out of the blocks, I think if we had, we were expecting a different result obviously, but not to be unfortunately.” 

For a team that are usually so full of energy, the Barrs were flat for three quarters of the game here as they struggled to deal with Nemo’s intensity, particularly around the breaking ball. To question as to why the reigning champions were the way they were will bounce around Bandon Road over the winter.

“When you were shouting and roaring at lads at half time trying to get the lads up, you know that you’re in a spot of bother," O'Keeffe admitted. "They came out then and tacked on, I think it was two points, at the start of the second half after we had attacked and got nothing out of it and they came up and scored again. You’re just waiting for something to happen.

“Then we got a couple of goals but their goal was a sickener as well and we just left ourselves with a mountain to climb. Maybe if we hadn’t conceded the goal when we did, we’d have still been in the game but when they pulled out to eight plus points ahead you knew that we were going to struggle. At least we showed a bit of character in the end but too often that’s the story with us.

“It was something that we spoke about before the game (the breaks), and our stats on breaks were phenomenal all year but maybe just the occasion got to us. I think that’s what happened, all the talk of the Double, the centenary and all of that kind of stuff. It probably got to us more, clearly, than it got to Nemo. There’s no blame, these things happen. You learn from them and you move on.”