Offaly 1-17 Carlow 2-11
That’s what the scoreboard registered in O’Connor Park, Tullamore on Saturday as Carlow’s hopes of progressing through to the quarter finals of the Leinster Senior Hurling Championship faded against a strong Offaly side.
Kevin Regan, who was on commentary for KCLR, spoke to Carlow senior hurling manager Pat English in the wake of the loss, English summing up result simply as one that leaves Carlow ‘devastated’.
That’s probably another match we should have won. We should have scored 1-4 straight after the break. We started very well in both halves and just didn’t keep the momentum going.
We were three points worse off than our opposition today and we should have scored earlier, but that’s sport. We have to take from it, we have to build [on] it. We have to come back, finish off the season against Westmeath, play with pride as the they have done for the last three or four months right through the season and then regroup and get back again.
As well as picking up the loss in Tullamore, the final five minutes of the game produced two red cards for Carlow, the first for Diarmuid Byrne who collected a straight red adjudged for laying ahand on the helmet of Shane Kinsella while a second straight red was issued to Hugh Paddy O’Byrne towards the death.
We’ll have more reaction across Monday on sport and on The Way It Is from 6pm Monday evening.
