‘We thought we had pace, but that was on another level’

Ladies football

Lurgan Ladies’ manager Anthony Brady expressed both pride and a sense of disappointment after his team's Ulster Championship final defeat to Clann Éireann.

“We’re very proud of the girls for getting here, but it’s one thing to say we’re proud, we wanted to push on and compete,” he said.

“Clann Éireann are a fabulous team, and they’re a step ahead of where we are at the minute. We have a very young team, and this has been a great learning experience for us.”

The Lurgan manager noted the gap between the two teams in terms of experience, conditioning, and speed of play.

“Gregory McGonigle and the Clann Éireann club have a county set-up mentality, and you can see that in the conditioning, pace, and the way they break with the ball. We thought we had pace, but that was on another level today,” Brady admitted.

“We did our best, and maybe we could have done a little bit better, but I don’t think even at our best we would have been able to compete with them. Some of their scores were excellent.”

Brady was particularly impressed by the individual quality of Clann Éireann’s forwards, singling out their key players. “Their number 14 is a fabulous footballer, and their number 12 got five points from play,” he said.

“We tried to change things around, even resorting to playing a sweeper, which we don’t usually do. But no matter what we did, they found answers and were able to block us out very well. They are a well-oiled machine.”

While the result was disappointing for Lurgan, Brady remained gracious in defeat, wishing Clann Éireann well in their next challenge.

“Fair play to them. I hope they do well now against the Galway champions, who are defending All-Ireland champions. It would be nice to see an Ulster team doing well in the All-Ireland series,” Brady said.

At one point, Lurgan managed to close the gap to just seven points, but Clann’s second goal saw the game slip away. “We brought it back to seven points at one stage, and then there was a sucker-punch,” Brady reflected. “That’s just the way some games go. They were first to every breaking ball, but we kept at it, kept pushing.”

Brady was particularly proud of his players' resilience, especially in the face of adversity.

“Kristina (Grigorenko) got a bad injury, but she played on, and it was only when she came off at the end that we realized she might have done some serious damage. That’s the character of her. She’s only 17,” he said.

“We had a full-back line of 17, 17, and 19 years old, and I think we had 10 players who are teenagers on the field today. When they mature in their early 20s, this experience will stand to them. Big days like this won’t faze them. We just have to push on and hopefully, there will be something there for us to work with in the future.”

The challenge now is to return stronger.

“You’d hope (Lurgan will return to this stage), but let’s go back to Cavan first,” he said. “It’s not a given to win the Cavan Championship. As I said before, Crosserlough helped us raise our standards, and now those standards will be the benchmark for Cavan club football. Whoever comes out of Cavan next year – and hopefully, it will be Lurgan – will know that they have to push on a little bit further.”