Niall Ó Ceallacháin: 'Game could have looked different if we'd taken a few opportunities'

Dublin manager Niall Ó Ceallacháin will lament his side's failure to raise a green flag on Saturday. Picture: Tom O'Hanlon/Inpho

All-Ireland SHC quarter-final: Clare 0-29 Dublin 0-16

What else could Niall Ó Ceallacháin do but lament the failure of his Dublin team to raise a single green flag from seven goal opportunities.

The manager's lamentations, mind, came after he sent well-wishes on behalf of the Dublin camp to the hospitalised David Reidy.

Dublin raised 15 green flags across their six Leinster outings. It put them top of the championship goal chart, alongside Galway.

They didn’t lack for opportunities to increase that number in Saturday’s All-Ireland quarter-final. They just couldn’t manage to steer a single one of their seven goal shots beyond an unbreachable Éibhear Quilligan.

Donal Burke, Ronan Hayes, Conal Ó Riain, and John Hetherton were all unsuccessful. From play, from placed balls, and even from the boot, they could not best the Banner No.1.

“Clare started off really well. We started off slow. They had all the energy for the first 15 minutes. It looked grim at that point. I thought our lads responded really, really well to go in at half-time three points down. I thought we were set up well for the second half and that we would kick on, but we didn't kick on. Heavy loss in the end,” surmised Dublin boss Ó Ceallacháin.

“Our shooting efficiency is what let us down. Shot count, there wasn't much in it. We had seven shots on goal and no goal, so we'll never know. A heavy defeat, but if we had taken one or two of those chances, you don't know.

“That game could have looked very different if we had taken two, three, or four of those opportunities. Suddenly, you are in a very different spot. We created seven opportunities and on most days, you'll score a couple of goals, but fair play to Quilligan there.” 

Despite being just three in arrears at the break, a definite problem for Dublin was finding scores from play. Seven of their first-half 0-11 came from Donal Burke’s dead-ball accuracy. They registered just one first-half point from play beyond the 10th minute.

No more than their inability to convert goal chances, here was another stat that fell well short of what is required to reach the last four of the championship.

“We'd 100% off frees in the first-half. Our ability to get shots off in that first-half, from areas we'd likely score from, was limited.”