Having lead by 10 points at one stage in Saturday’s Glen Dimplex All-Ireland senior camogie championship opening round, Kilkenny looked home and hosed ahead of a break before facing Dublin. Until they weren’t.
In the windup, Kilkenny switched off for their final ten minutes on home soil at UPMC Nowlan Park, allowing Wexford to take control of a game at the death to reel in their hosts and snatch a 3-11 to 1-17 draw.
“(We’re) very disappointed”, Kilkenny manager Brian Dowling told Martin Quilty after the final whistle. “When you’re 10 points up in a game, you’d want to be winning it and seeing it out. I’ll have to look at it back and see where it all went wrong, that’s not good enough. No one went out to do that, I said to the girls, it’s in your own hands win the last two games and you’ll top the group. We just have to get the head down and plough on and be ready for Dublin in two weeks.”
“The first half was ok, some nice scores. Delighted with the response in the second half, we came out all guns blazing and we blew them away. That just shows what we can do, we just need to do it for longer. It’s not good enough doing it for ten minutes in each half – we have to up the ante the whole time, ten points there and they turned it around, that’s not good enough and we have to rectify it.”
“I can’t remember the first one, the second one she broke through the middle, the last one was very soft just a flick to the net, we have to be stronger there and make sure she’s not getting that touch. We can’t be conceding three goals at this level it’s not good enough and we have to sort it out, we scored 1-17, and we only scored two points in the last quarter, if we had to get another few more points we have won the game and that’s disappointing.”
No score in the last ten minutes
“It definitely was the period of time the damage was done, they totally out-hurled us in that part, and we probably weren’t getting the ball through to the girls inside there was loads of space inside and they were dangerous, they were scoring when they got the ball, but we stopped getting it through, that’s disappointing but we just have to plough on now, the year isn’t over yet, just have to drive it on again on Tuesday night”
“Dublin is not going to fear us after the two games this year, we just have to knuckle down and make sure we’re ready for Dublin, it’s still the same situation as the last day, we still have to win and we’re going up there to hopefully get the win and keep us in the championship”
