Offaly manager Brian Whelahan has slammed his hurlers' "lack of fight" during their Walsh Cup hammering at the hands of Galway in Tullamore.
The Tribesmen cantered into the semi-finals yesterday after holding a wind-assisted 1-17 to 0-5 interval advantage. Offaly managed to win the second half by three points but it still finished 2-22 to 1-13 in the visitors' favour.
“[I was] very disappointed with a lot of things today," Whelahan told Midlands 103. "The lack of real fight, especially in the first half ... to look out on the field ... was just something that shouldn't happen to an Offaly team. Especially playing Galway.
“We couldn’t have looked for better preparation coming into the game but we didn’t bring it to Tullamore today.”
Offaly's Shane Dooley saw his one on one penalty saved against Galway today pic.twitter.com/erO9f2HWdk
— Midlands103Sport (@MidlandsSport) January 25, 2015
The two-time All-Ireland winner refused to use the introduction of new players into the backlines as an excuse, and said he'll be looking for a response in training as the Faithful approach their league opener in Laois on St Valentine's Day.
"That’s going to be a huge game," asserted Whelahan. "Laois are obviously going very well. They’re going to be looking forward to having Offaly on home turf on February 14th. We just have to hope that our response to today will come out on that night.
"We will be trying to rectify a lot of the problems that showed up there today in training over the next couple of weeks."
