Cathal Dowd
Waterford Camogie manager Mick Boland believes his team need to play much better in the next round to reach an All-Ireland final, saying on their performance in the quarter-final against Clare “That’ll win no semi-final”.
Waterford overcame their Munster rivals 2-20 to 2-10 at Croke Park to make it back to the All-Ireland semi-finals for the third time in four years.
A dominant Niamh Rockett display was crucial to the Deise’s march into the final four, in a game that was closer than the scoreline ultimately suggested.
A late attacking flurry by Waterford pulled them away from the Banner and their determined showing.
Despite the victory, Boland was unimpressed with his side’s performance, “That’ll win no semi final, the performance has to go up a lot higher than that” he said.
Having missed out on progressing straight to the semi-finals in a loss to Galway last week, Boland said at the time an extra game in Croke Park might help his team adjust to the conditions and he echoed those sentiments after this tie, “Maybe the quarter-final was a good route to take because it gave us an opportunity to play up here and give the girls a small bit more confidence”.
Boland also recognized that the game plan may need some tweaking as Waterford hope to claim the O’Duffy cup for the first time, saying “We are going to have to work very hard because the last two teams we have come up against have been playing a plus one and we are finding it difficult to break them down at times, we are creating some goal chances but we are finding it difficult when they put a lot of bodies around the middle, they seem to turn over a bit of ball in that area”.
“We probably took the scenic route this time, going through the quarter-final, and sometimes you have to grind a result out and that was one of those results”, said the Deise manager.
Knowing that Waterford will face a much tougher task in the semi-final, Boland believes his side are capable but need to bring their best, “If you don’t bring your performance to the field you don’t win matches”.
He added, “They were very hard to play against, and any team we face now will filter players back and squeeze the middle, so we will need to find a way to play the ball through the hands to create the little triangles and spaces and get the scores”.
Even with their manager’s frustration being evident post-match, Waterford are only one game away from an All-Ireland final, where they would hope to redeem themselves from their 2023 loss.
