Karl McKaigue fears Slaughtneil are running out of chances in their quest to land the Andy Merrigan Cup.

"Younger lads are coming into our senior team and we are getting to this stage every year and they are thinking, 'It will eventually come some year,' but eventually you will get nipped somewhere down the line," he told the Irish Daily Star ahead of tomorrow's All-Ireland club SFC semi-final against Nemo Rangers.

"You have to try and make the most of each chance you get, because last year we left it behind us a wee bit (against Dr Crokes). We have a good chance of getting back to a final only, we are not looking past Nemo.

"We will try and rectify the wrongs of last year, but it will take a tremendous effort to try and get over Nemo because we've already seen what they done to Dr Crokes this year. They blew them out of the water and could have won by a lot more so we'll be up against it."

The Emmet's defender admits that last year's St. Patrick's Day loss to Dr Crokes still rankles.

"If you are in an All-Ireland final in the first half, your tails are up, you've just scored a goal and I think we were two or three up at that stage. Then we were hit with that red card and next thing it comes crashing down," he reflected.

"You are trying to keep things tight but you can't influence the scoreboard at the other end. Against Crokes last year they went out and did what they had to do, they didn't come out and blitz us in the second half with the extra man.

"They kept it very measured and calm and always had a spare man at the back and done enough to win the game.

"We kept things well at the back but we could never score enough to really trouble them. It was very disappointing; much more so than the All-Ireland defeat of 2015 to Corofin. That day we weren't competitive. There was 10 points in it, eight at half-time and you can't really be too disappointed because you never really looked like winning it. But certainly that Dr Crokes game was there for the taking and very hard to take to this day."

Tweet

Most Read Stories