One puck of a ball was all that was in it. At the end of the five-match sprint, as Dublin dipped for the line, they came up agonisingly short. So close, yet so far. So, instead of preparing to play in the Allianz Hurling League quarter-finals on Sunday, Dublin will be hitting the road again for a Division One A relegation match with Waterford.
Dwelling on past
Joey Boland isn't one for dwelling on the past. Of the comings and goings of last Sunday's defeat to Tipperary, when his team lost by three points but a two-point defeat would have been enough to get them into the play-offs, Boland is matter of fact in his honesty.
“We knew we had to win anyway. We weren’t aware of the Waterford-Kilkenny result. People were filtering (news) on that we still had to get the win, then people were saying ‘just keep ticking away, play your own game’.
“In a match like that, which is very high intensity, where messages are coming in, and then stuff can be lost as well because players are so focused. We are where we are, we’re not going to cry over a point or two. It’s our own fault to be in this position,” said Boland.
The blame game isn’t apportioned anywhere. It didn’t come down to a dropped ball from Niall McMorrow in search of a goal when a point would have done. It didn’t come down to anything other than not delivering over the five-match race that brought wins over All-Ireland champions Clare and league champions Kilkenny but defeat to Galway, Waterford and Tipperary.The Galway game is the one that left the sourest taste.
“We started the league quite badly down in Galway so if we had started the league with a win, we wouldn’t be in this position. But we had a couple of good performances since then, been on the wrong side of one or two ding-dong battles. Waterford down there could have gone either way, Tipperary last Sunday could have gone either way.
“We could have lost one or two of the games that we won. We’re kind of happy it’s in our hands at this time of the year, we have a chance to retain our One A status.”
After losing out to Tipp to a late point that decided who went on to a quarter-final and who went into the hat for the relegation, Dublin lost the toss to determine home advantage. "We've got the advantage of having played there two for three weeks ago, so I think it's a level playing field."
Conditions
That day over a fortnight ago was not a day or a surface of pretty hurling. Boland, though, doesn't mind what the conditions are like on Sunday, a game that will bring with it a near-12-week break until Dublin resume for action in the championship.
As he put it: “Some described it as a bit like a rugby match: there was 10 on one side of the field, 10 on the other side. We’re actually quite good at that because we play in Parnell Park and it’s a bog half the time. If it’s out in Croke Park in the middle of open spaces, we’ve the legs for that; if it’s in a bog, we’ve got the bodies and strength for that. Whatever turns up, we’ll be ready for it.”
