Tyrrell admits team standards are 'slipping'

GAELIC GAMES:ALL STAR defender Jackie Tyrrell has delivered a damning verdict on Kilkenny's Allianz Hurling League final display, describing it as "the worst performance I was ever involved in with Kilkenny".

Tyrrell, who captained Kilkenny to the All-Ireland title in 2006, candidly admitted the 12-point defeat showed Kilkenny’s standards are “slipping”. He also acknowledged Dublin’s demolition job last Sunday left Kilkenny frustrated, leading to untypical incidents of indiscipline which look set to land them in hot water with GAA disciplinary officials.

Tyrrell said: “It came out in all of us and came out probably in Eoin (Larkin) in the first half, John Dalton and a few other incidents as well where lads were getting frustrated. You never really see that out of Kilkenny teams, lashing out and things like that. It was frustrating but we can’t point the finger at anyone – we just have to look at ourselves and start from there. If we get our own house in order and get back to what we were doing, with the work-rate, we might have a chance.”

Tyrrell added: “It was the worst performance I was ever involved in with Kilkenny. It’s not just one or two things – a lot of things in our game weren’t up to scratch. Fair play to Dublin – they’re really moving in the right direction but we seem to be going backwards.”

Tyrrell revealed that in the dressingroom before throw-in last Sunday Kilkenny felt ready for battle, but were left with no answers as Dublin restricted them to just 1-7 over the 70 minutes.

He said: “From the start Dublin set out their task and tempo and we just couldn’t match them. You could say the sending-off (of Eoin Larkin) changed the game. I don’t think if we had 15 men we would have beaten Dublin. That’s a serious problem for us.

“Kilkenny, back through the years, we would have never said that. We would have said, if we have our house in order, we’d be in with a shout, but on Sunday we were blown off the field in all aspects – physicality, fitness, speed, hurling. It’s something that we have to address.

“We’ll all have to take a good long look at ourselves in the mirror. I think we need to get back to what we were doing in the last couple of years – an unbelievable work-rate, more so in our forwards, putting teams under pressure, forcing turnovers and getting scores.

“That was what we built our run on in winning the few All-Irelands. (But) we’ve gone away from doing that – Dublin are doing it, all other teams are doing it. They’ve just passed us out and we need to get back to that.”

Tyrrell admitted it’s a “comfort” to have a number of top names returning for the championship to bolster an injury-ravaged squad, but warned it’s no guarantee of success. He said: “Things like leadership on Sunday were non-existent, and you can’t instil that in a team overnight.

“It is a comfort that we have the lads coming back but we can’t rely on that alone. It’s hard to know where we can start, really.

“I don’t think any one of the 15 or the subs that came in can say they did themselves justice, worked hard for the team or anything like that. That’s letting your standards slip. We’ve held high standards and we’ve been proud of what we’ve done but we’ve slipped. But we’ve known that they’ve been slipping, we’ve been seeing it in our performances.

“We just carried on but on Sunday it all came to a head and we need to really, really seriously sit down and see what’s going on and what we can do about it.”

He added: “The lads were down in the dumps a bit (afterwards) but realistically, with 10 or 15 minutes to go, the game was over. To say that for a Kilkenny team in a National League final against Dublin at Croke Park is crazy. But that’s really how it was and we kind of accepted that; we didn’t drive on and try to make a comeback. That’s disappointing. That’s the first time I’ve said it and it’s weird saying it.”

Tyrrell believes the only way for Kilkenny to turn their season around is through sheer hard work. He admitted: “Our training has dropped, our intensity levels have dropped. You’d be hoping over the next week that we’ll have bruising sessions. That’s the only way to get it back.”