Gary Brennan feels Clare's second-half defending made the difference for them against Roscommon in Saturday's All-Ireland SFC qualifier.

Following the 2-12 to 1-9 win over the Rossies, the midfield stalwart revealed that he had carried a virus into the game but was still able to give a significant contribution as the Banner men reached the All-Ireland SFC quarter-finals for the first time.

"I had a virus coming into it but, listen, I won't make any excuses," Brennan told the Iris Examiner.

"I think I blew the gasket in the first half. Guys stepped up when they needed to. We had brilliant energy there in places when we needed it in the second half. The defensive effort was outstanding."

On the gameplan going in against Rossies, Brennan added: "We knew they would be well organised and we had to start the game at pace. We started slowly the last couple of weeks. We knew we had to change the pace of the game in the first half for ourselves and thankfully we did that. They were coming off playing in a defeat six days (earlier) so we were going to try and put the pressure on them as early as we could, and thankfully we did that."

Tweet

Most Read Stories