Tipp show glimpses of improvement as focus turns to Clare

You could be nothing but proud of the Tipp lads after the way they finished last Sunday.

Yes, we can thank a poor umpiring decision for aiding the recovery but we made our own luck with how mentally strong we were, and don’t forget that the soft sending off in the first half went a long way towards us struggling so badly in the second half. There are plenty of things to work on but character is the hardest aspect to instil in a team and they have shown it in spades over the last two weekends. Ordinarily when we struggle we are not up for the battle but keep in the game with sheer skill, but this time the opposite occurred on many occasions.

On Sunday, I felt like what we were trying to do was nearly always the right idea, but maybe the rocky start to the championship has put a few doubts into players heads with the final pass or decision going astray from time to time. If we can claw our way into the top three next weekend I could really see us building up a head of steam going forward.

I’ve written recently about the need to improve when we have the ball, especially in the transition from defence to attack. Looking at the game up until the sending off, it is highly likely that this was worked on or at least talked about during the week. On several occasions, the full back line popped passes to their half back line colleagues who tried to pick men out up the field. Of course, this is championship hurling and is not always possible but we created plenty of scoring chances except for a lean period after half time. We scored 12 points in the first half and only for Jason Forde having a poor patch with the shooting it would have been more. 

 

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