Billy Clery: 'It’s two points dropped, there is no shying away from that'

Paul Corcoran reports from Eamonn Deacy Park

The Women’s National League got underway on Saturday and there was a six goal thriller played at Eamonn Deacy Park as Galway were held to a 3-3 draw by Cork City.

Galway went 2-0 up in the first half with their goals being provided by Rachel Kearns, Cork drew level for the first time with  Lauren Egbuloniu and Eabha O’Mahony both on target for the visitors.

Kearns completed her hat-trick just before half-time but there was one last twist in the game when Becky Cassin earned a share of the points for her side with a long range effort in the 85^th minute.

Given the strong position Galway had been in, and the amount of chances they had throughout the 90 minutes, manager Billy Clery was upfront about his disappointment at the result.

“We’re very disappointed, it feels like we lost the game,” Clery said, speaking to the press after the game.

“I think we had buckets loads of chances, a missed penalty, a couple off the post. We made three errors and we were punished three times.

“I think they possibly had another few chances in the game after that but I think our chance rate was well into double figures but we just didn’t convert them and were punished.

“If you look at the first half, we were 2-0 up and we were cruising, I think our goalkeeper touched the ball twice in the first 25 minutes and with their first attack they go up the pitch and they score, I suppose it put a bit of doubt in the players and a bit of anxiety and next attack they score again.

“In fairness then, Rachel did fantastic for us up front with a cracking third goal.

“At half time we came in to regroup and again in the second half we battered them for the vast majority of the game we just didn’t put the ball in the net and we got punished.

“It’s two points dropped, there’s no shying away from that. It’s 100 percent two points dropped but look it’s the first game of the season.

“There was a lot of good play in the game just we didn’t convert the chances we created and made silly mistakes that we were punished for.”

Galway had by far the most chances yesterday but Clery didn’t point to their attacking style as what exposed them during yesterday’s game but rather a lack of composure int heir passing.

“We’re playing a different way at the back and trying to be more adventurous going forward but it wasn’t even bad defending,” he said.

“It was sloppy passes given away in the final third, we shouldn’t be giving the ball away under little or no pressure we were just giving stray passes, a bit of neglect, that complacency then gets punished.

“Once it happened once, it gives a bit of self-doubt to the players they start questioning themselves, the fear comes into it and that sort of took over for 10 or 12 minutes at the back end of the first half.

“In the second half we had all the play, I know the keeper made a decent save early in the second half but for the rest of it we battered them and I don’t think anyone watching it could say otherwise.

“We just had an off day I suppose, it’s hard to say you had an off day after scoring three goals but we did we should have punished them and taken the three points.”