Carlow Senior Hurling manager Colm Bonnar was happy with the character that they showed to fight back with 13 men and claim a draw against Antrim.
Speaking to KCLR, Colm says they reacted very positively to the numerical disadvantage.
“I thought we were soaking up the pressure. We were keeping maybe 4 points ahead of them for most of the 2nd half until I think it was Shiels tried his hand on a quick free and they got a goal out of it, and it really drove them on and it gave them a sense that they could win the game.
“They knocked over a couple of points, and I think they went a point up so at that stage I was getting bit worried and then we had a player sent-off and so obviously I was kind of saying we need to hold on in here and to be fair to the lads they dug deep.
“Marty(Kavanagh) was driving forward, James (Doyle) was unlucky for a penalty there, we were the team that was driving forward in the last 5 or 6 minutes so that is very positive from our point of view”
Bonnar added that he was conscious of not overusing Marty Kavanagh and James Doyle.
The two players are involved for IT Carlow in Friday’s Fitzgibbon Cup Semi-Finals.
“Yeah well look to be fair to those lads, I would have seen them play with(St.) Mullins and I think more or less when they got beaten by Cuala the following week, they were in with the College Team and they were playing.
“They went straight into that League games with the College and they went all the way to the League Final so they have had no rest. They are going going going so I was just conscious of that like but that is the strength of our players.
“On any given day, we have a number of selections that we could put down. We told them that players will have to come on and make a difference and change the game and I think definitely the lads we brought on”
You can listen to the full interview below.
https://soundcloud.com/kclr96fm/colm-bonnar-after-antrim-nhl-2017
