Carrick Ladies feel the heat
Wednesday, 3 September 2008
A REASONABLY contained first half performance which saw them turn around only two goals adrift almost turned into a mini rout for Carrick Ladies on Saturday afternoon as visitors Randalstown took full advantage of their superior fire power and experience.
But for an inexplicable umpiring decision, Carrick should have been the first team on the scoresheet when a perfectly good Christine Waide goal was somehow judged to have been struck outside the circle when it was clearly hit from inside. Carrick nonetheless continued to contest the game strongly and it wasn't until late in the opening half that Randalstown scored twice to take the lead.
“I certainly wouldn't suggest the disallowed goal was a turning point in the match," said Carrick captain Lorna Hill. "There's no denying that Randalstown were always the better side and, as the game went on, we just couldn't compete with their greater experience and team skills. But a 2-1 scoreline at half time might just have helped us hold our game together a little longer into the second half. We knew Randalstown would seriously test us as we tired and that's exactly what happened."
“This was always going to be a huge task for us" continued Lorna "and while we obviously can't be happy with our second half performance, it's been an invaluable experience for everyone. Today's game clearly showed us that we've some serious work to do on our attacking play and we need to be able to absorb pressure from a strong team for an entire match, not just the opening half. On the plus side, our younger players learnt some important lessons today and I was very impressed with Kerry McIlroy who stood up extremely well throughout the entire game.
“We have intentionally planned our pre-season programme against higher placed opposition," continued Lorna, "and with two more friendly games coming up against Senior One opposition, the girls now realise they'll have to considerably improve their standards to avoid another defeat like today. It's been a big disappointment for our coach and officials that we've struggled with player availability throughout our entire pre-season programme, both in training and in match play. We haven't once had a full quota of players to choose from and we were missing people again today. Apparently we'll also have others unavailable for next Saturday's game against UUJ. I know these situations are sometimes unavoidable but it's been particularly bad this year. If we're to stand any reasonable chance of competing effectively in Senior Two, we need full attendance at training and at matches to build a settled squad. Our first league match is against Parkview on 20 September so we need to get organised quickly. We know we can play a lot better than we did today but everyone needs to be there to sort things out!" concluded Lorna.
