Sport

Fleury to demand step up in form

Offaly manager Pat Fleury said that his team would have to make enormous improvements before the semi-final against Cork

By PAT ROCHE
Mon Jul 24 2000 - 01:00

Offaly manager Pat Fleury said that his team would have to make enormous improvements before the semi-final against Cork. "That level of performance just would not be good enough and we would not be at the races against the Munster champions if we repeated it."

Fleury said Offaly were very worried when Derry hit their purple patch in the second half. "They were coming at us strongly at that time and the introduction of Joe Dooley and Joe Errity helped to steady us.

"Expecting Offaly to win easily was unrealistic. They (Derry) are good Ulster champions and they were always going to be treated seriously by us."

Fleury added: "It's now obvious that we have a new force coming out of Ulster to be reckoned with."

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Johnny Pilkington, at wing forward for Offaly on the day, said: "We stumbled over it and in fact we have been stumbling all year. We are still not moving the ball fast enough. When we did move it fast in the first half we caught Derry. In the second half against the wind the ball was hanging in the air."

Pilkington added: "Now we are only 70 minutes from an All-Ireland final. We won All-Irelands before without impressive form earlier on and we know how to get there."

Derry manager Kevin McNaughton was amused by the erratic scoreboard displays which often showed the wrong score in the second half when the match was extremely exciting. But he said: "It didn't bother us one minute. We knew the referee would have it right in the end."

McNaughton said that his team competed all the way and added: "We came down here to win. We know we are not that far away. I always thought we were in with a chance. We were hurling so well."

The unluckiest man on the day was Derry's Oliver Collins, who had to retire in the second half with an Achilles tendon injury.

He said: "We put in a hell of a performance, and remember this is our first time down here. I am certain that this team will be back at this stage of the competition and go better."

The Derry public relations officer, Anne Sands reckoned that it was the best performance by an Ulster team since Antrim got through to the final in 1989.

She added: "We were looking very good, playing the best hurling of the year and they (Offaly) were forced to bring on their big men, (Joe) Dooley and (Joe) Errity in an effort to contain us."