Brian Lohan: We didn't get a huge amount from the referee

While acknowledging his team’s first-half performance was substandard, the Clare manager questioned the officiating of Colm Lyons

NOT HAPPY: Referee Colm Lyons and Clare manager Brian Lohan. Pic: INPHO/Bryan Keane

Brian Lohan felt referee Colm Lyons was unfair on his Clare team in this All-Ireland semi-final.

While acknowledging his team’s first-half performance was substandard, the manager questioned the officiating and stated: “There’s a rule there that I can’t be critical of referees.” 

Asked about Lyons’ call to end advantage and bring back the play for a foul on Peter Duggan when Mark Rodgers was striking to the net in the 46th minute, Lohan said: “Yeah, sure look, he had blown the whistle. But didn’t seem to get a huge amount from the referee today. Found it hard to get frees.” 

Clare prospered when they went away from their extra defender in the second half, winning the period by two points and outscoring Kilkenny 0-7 to 0-2 in the third quarter. Explaining the sweeper move, Seadna Morey a late replacement for Ian Galvin, Lohan referenced last year’s All-Ireland semi-final loss to The Cats.

“Well look, I suppose last year we felt we played the game on their terms. They had the extra defender back and we didn’t make use of the ball the way we might and left a huge amount of space. We didn’t want to be out of the game at half-time. I know we were just about in the game and we didn’t want to be out of it again, conceding goals early on.

“And also, we didn’t want to push up on them, it’s hard enough defending their forwards. But to defend against that quality and that space, we just didn’t want to do that. We made a decision on that to go with the plus one, or the sweeper or whatever you want to call it and we went in, 15-10 at half-time, so we were still in the game. Five points isn’t much in hurling. We changed it round, thought our players played really well in the second half.” 

Derek Lyng admitted surprise at Clare’s tactical plan in the opening half. “We haven't seen that this year with them. When we heard the change before the match, we had an idea that might be the case.

“I think we coped pretty well with it. You were in a strong position on the back of that at half-time. But they changed things around for the second half, got more of a run at us and posed more questions of us at that stage. We just saw it through and just managed it out.”