Managers View
Johnny Campbell, Loughgiel
By Brendan McTaggart
Stood waiting in the Ballycastle changing rooms for what felt like an eternity, the Shamrock players made their way out to face the reality of it all after Sunday’s final. The realisation of defeat in a championship final just gets worse with every passing hour and the Loughgiel men were suffering. Every one of them looked pained. The type of pain that only comes from a defeat in the final to your fiercest rivals.
Loughgiel manager Johnny Campbell was one of the last to leave the changing rooms. You could tell he couldn’t see us far enough but faced up to the waiting media. The pain of a final loss etched over his face yet the Shamrocks manager was magnanimous in defeat: “There’s no question about it, the better team won. Most of the game was played on Cushendall’s terms and we couldn’t get our players into the game and that makes the difference on big days.” Campbell continued: “Whether that was down to us or how they went about their work, I’m not sure but we didn’t win too many individual battles all over the pitch for us to get anything going.”
The Shamrocks made a promising start to Sunday’s final, twice opening a two point lead at 0-4 0-2 and 0-7 0-5 before Cushendall landed the first major blow of the match and scored the opening goal. Campbell acknowledged the significance of Paddy Burke’s goal, adding: “It was always going to be nip and tuck but goals win games is the cliché and it proved to be the case.
“We lost individual battles around the middle third and they capitalised and supported each other better than we did and it’s something that we set out to do but they were better than us.”
It was a double whammy for the Shamrocks, their minors losing out in a titanic battle with Dunloy in the curtain raiser while suffering their first defeat in the decider since 2008, the last of the six finals lost in succession. Once they get to the decider, they have an inner belief and knowhow of the big occasion that drives them to getting the job done but on Sunday they came up short. Campbell told us that the Shamrocks will be back for another tilt in 2019 while keeping an eye on the talent coming through the ranks at Fr Healy Park: “Hopefully but I’m sure Dunloy will have something to say about that too. It was a good championship this year, unfortunately it wasn’t the right result for us.
“St Johns have entered the fray now as well and I hope that once the boys have a rest they’ll be back out and at it next year again with hopefully a couple added out of the minor panel into the mix too.
“Loughgiel will be about for the next few years and will be competitive but time will tell.”