Conroy looking for big response from Portlaoise women following loss to Liffey Celtics

Midland Park Portlaoise Panthers 51 

Flomax Liffey Celtics 74 

PORTLAOISE Panthers head coach, Keith Conroy is adamant his players must learn from their 23-point reversal at the hands of a FloMAX Liffey Celtics outfit many are tipping as the team to beat in this season’s Women’s Super League title race.

After having stunned Paudie O’Connor National Cup holders Gurranabraher Credit Union Brunell with a 19-point defeat on the opening weekend of the season, Portlaoise were hoping to serve up an even bigger shock by unhinging last season’s WSL runners-up, Celtics when they paid a visit to St Mary’s Hall on Saturday night.

But the Leixlip side were not about to suffer the same fate as Brunell and tore from the blocks to lead by 17 at the half-time break, with Panthers unable to prise away their grip on this tie in the second half.

“It was a tough one going up against, possibly the best team in the country,” said Portlaoise boss, Conroy.

“We just didn’t get a break, nothing dropped for us. They hit big shots at big times and that’s what good teams do, but we’ll learn from this and that’s the most important thing.

“We know where certain things went wrong, we know what we can do to improve and that’s what we have to do. We have to learn from games like this.

“We know how good a team like Liffey Celtics are and we know we can hang with them when we do the right things” he told the ******Laois Nationalist*****.

Portlaoise did struggle to get motoring on Saturday night, shipping 11 points by the time they finally managed to open their account through Jasmine Burke just over three minutes into proceedings.

Buckets from Áine O’Connor and Eboni Williams, coupled with a three-pointer from Kate O’Flaherty and free throws from Alexis Tucker had Liffey Celtics well up and running by then.

Ciara Byrne did make all of her four free throws for the home side in the opening quarter, but their Kildare rivals still held an 11-point advantage (21-10) heading into the second.

Tucker and O’Flaherty combined for a further 16 in that period as Celtics pushed their lead out to 17 by the half-time recess (42-25).

Portlaoise did manage to dig in after the break and actually took the third quarter by the narrowest of margins thanks in no small measure to the six points that co-captain, Alyssa Velles put up.

But they needed a lot more impact in attack if they were to make any serious in-roads into Celtics’ lead and, while they did account for the opening two scores of the fourth quarter though Byrne, the mountain was to prove just too steep.

Karl Kilbride’s team clicked back into gear and seven points from Tucker down the stretch, together with a combined 12 from Sorcha Tiernan and Hazel Finn, proved more than sufficient to keep last season’s runners-up well clear by the final buzzer.

Hoping to see his players bounce back quickly from this loss when they go on the road for the first time this season to face Catalyst Fr. Matthews, Conroy said “We have to be ready for next Saturday night when we play Fr. Mathews, which is a massive game for us, our first away game. We want to get back into that winning mind-set.

“We’ll move on from this loss, but we’ll take from it and hopefully get a ‘W’ next Saturday night” he added.

MIDLAND PARK PORTLAOISE PANTHERS: Shauna Dooley, Hailey Jordan, Ciara Byrne, Megan Dunne, Lynn Tunnah, Jasmine Burke, Caoimhe Brophy, Sarah Fleming, Amy Dooley, Alyssa Velles, Shannon Quigley.

Top Scorers: Amy Dooley (12), Ciara Byrne (9), Hailey Jordan (8), Alyssa Velles (8).

FloMAX LIFFEY CELTICS: Alexis Tucker, Kelly Bracken, Kate O’Flaherty, Ciara Bracken, Eboni Williams, Rachel Huijsdens, Katie O’Sullivan, Clara Boyce, Sorcha Tiernan, Hazel Finn, Áine O’Connor.

Top Scorers: Alexis Tucker (19), Sorcha Tiernan (12), Kate O’Flaherty (11), Eboni Williams (9).