Let’s be honest here, you didn’t really predict Carlow would beat Kildare, did you? That ‘gut feeling’ you had before the game was that Carlow might push them close for 50 – 60 minutes and, like their encounters with Monaghan and Dublin last summer, prove that they don’t have to always bow down before their Division 1 overlords. Another moral victory was on the cards for poor little Carlow.
That being said, Sunday’s result in Tullamore has not redefined the idea of a Championship upset and may not even end up being the surprise result of the summer. They were 7/1 to win this game before the ball was thrown in, which was a personal insult to every Carlow person that has ever existed. They were outsiders, sure, and we all expected Kildare to win. But they were not 7/1 outsiders.
So how did a team with such long odds grab themselves a seven-point win? A portion of that winning margin needs to be attributed to Kildare’s performance, with their manager Cian O’Neill openly admitting that he was “disgusted” with their shooting accuracy after what he described as a “catastrophic” afternoon for the team.
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It was an honest appraisal from O’Neill, although Carlow’s defensive setup deserves credit for the way they smothered the (admittedly sluggish) Kildare forward line. This summer, we’ve already seen Galway exhibit a ruthless defence of their own ‘D’, in a process-driven approach to preventing goalscoring opportunities. Carlow operate off the same basis and, were it not for a bizarre goalkeeping error, they would have gone a second consecutive Championship match without conceding a goal.
Kildare’s accuracy of 32% shooting from play, as outlined by O’Neill post-match, is an important statistic in itself. But, compared with Carlow’s figure, it is an incredible one. Kildare’s poor shooting resulted in 12 wides. Carlow did not hit a single one.
Carlow’s accuracy pervades through every facet of their game plan, not just in their shooting. With plenty of men behind the ball, they naturally live off counter-attacking football. But it is not the laser-quick, end-to-end movement we have seen elsewhere throughout this decade in gaelic football. Rather, they employ a method of keeping the ball and working it up the pitch in a fashion that would suggest that possession is more important than catching the opponent off-guard.
Sure, if Paul Broderick is in front of his man and in acres of space, you better believe Carlow are launching that ball forward as quickly as they can, but if he is in a 50/50 tussle with his marker, bet your house on Carlow taking the safe option and utilising the hand-pass as often as they need. It’s a remarkably effective plan that suits a physical side who don’t get dispossessed easily.
Final eight contenders
It also helps that there is now real belief not only in the dressing room, but also on the terraces. There is a vociferous, growing support following Turlough O’Brien’s side, with many of them enjoying the lack of an inferiority complex for the first time in their lives. It was a special afternoon in Tullamore on Sunday, and props to everyone involved in the longest-lasting pitch invasion of all-time.
On OTB AM this morning, we spoke about that atmosphere and the visible evidence that the Carlow Rising is merely gathering momentum. We also got reaction from Turlough O’Brien, Steven Poacher, Daniel St. Ledger, Darragh Foley and Cian O’Neill.
We daresay the Carlow footballers had an enjoyable night on Sunday, but so too did Brendan Hennessey and Willie Quinlan, you would suspect. The pair were on commentary duty for KCLR radio in Tullamore, with typically euphoric reactions from both in the dying stages. We caught up with their pair outside O’Connor Park, which you can view below.
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