If watching UCC lose out in the Sigerson Cup final was tough for Paul O’Keeffe, the post mortem was almost as bad.
The UCC manager wanted to be anywhere but the Croke Park media room beneath the Hogan Stand, poring back over and dissecting where it all went wrong against UL.
With tongue in cheek, he suggested it was a bit of a masochistic thing to be doing, subjecting him to such torture after the 1-11 to 0-17 defeat.
“Ah it’s brutal, to be honest,” he said of the entire experience of losing a national final. “We never got out of the blocks. We spoke about the occasion and all the rest of it but we were slow getting out of the blocks, we gave them a bit of a lead.
“Then at half-time we were delighted because we played rubbish in the first half and we were level. You kind of felt, they’ve had their period of dominance and we were expecting to maybe drive on ourselves but the second half, we had loads of goal chances and just didn’t convert. And that hurts you. You have to take those chances.
“On a different day, they go in for you. Looking at the game overall, UL played better than us, they performed and we were just a bit off. We were at 70% for most of the game.
“Then towards the last quarter we were chasing it. We had a chance to maybe go level and missed it. Had we got it, I think we might have pushed on and won it but these are all the should have, could have, would haves, typical post-match stuff.”
UCC, who beat UL in the 2023 final to claim a 24th title, never actually led in a game they were favourites to win.
“They (UL) took the bull by the horns and fair play to them,” shrugged O’Keeffe, as the music blared from the nearby UL dressing-room.
“That’s Sigerson Cup football, you make your own history. I can hear them celebrating there. But look, I spoke to the lads before the game that if you don’t perform, that’s what you’re left with. I presume they (UL) will celebrate all the way home to Limerick tonight and fair play to them.”
