HIS eyes narrowed and he clenched his teeth as he got to the root of it.
Davy Fitzgerald said he could accept being out-scored after his Antrim team lost by 15 points of Offaly in Tullamore.
But being out-worked, out-tackled? No. He couldn’t stomach that.
“Our touch was way off today at different times,” he said.
“But if you look at the last three quarters, were we winning 50-50 balls? Honestly, were we winning them? I don’t think we were, I don’t think we were.
“That’s the question I’m going to ask them is: Why?
“We’re plenty fit enough but it didn’t even seem like that and I don’t know why. I suppose when the confidence drains out of you, you’re in trouble. If that confidence goes out of you outside (on the pitch) there, it’s a tough place to be.”
There are other issues for Fitzgerald to deal with and he repeated that “it might get worse before it gets better” for him and Antrim.
The county’s terrible away form continues to drag it down. Antrim’s last away win of note was a relegation play-off victory over Offaly in Navan back in March 2022. Since then, the Glensmen have been solid enough at Corrigan Park but have failed to do themselves justice on the road. Tullamore was the latest chapter.
“If you do look at Antrim over the last five or six years, it’s either right up there or right down there,” said Fitzgerald.
“There isn’t much middle ground if we’re being honest about it, it isn’t alone this year. Like, we were nine points to seven down, playing average but we were still in the game.
“Next thing we gave a sharp pass we shouldn’t have given and they got a goal out of it. We went five-six (points) down and once we went another point or two down it just was like… That was it.
“You could actually feel it on the sideline that we weren’t going to fight back and I don’t know why that is but it is something that has been happening and we’ve got to try and stop that. I don’t know what the answer is to it because they’ve worked really, really hard but we can’t be shipping beatings like that, end of story.”
Two points from Seaan Elliott briefly closed the gap to two points 10 minutes from half-time but after Dan Ravenhill’s goal the Ulstermen never looked like getting back into the game and Fitzgerald – whose side host Waterford in a fortnight – says they are now facing a battle for survival.
“We’re right in relegation now,” he said.
“There’s no point in saying anything else, so I’m not going to cover over that, that’s where we’re at and we’ve got to try and stay up, end of story.”
“I feel sorry for the boys because they put in an awful effort and they are good lads. They do work hard and, trust me, they have talent and you’ve seen it - when they’re good in Corrigan, they’re good.
“But we have to address (playing) away from Corrigan, like we’ve Waterford in Corrigan in two weeks’ time… They’re going to be really in form to give us a going-over because they won’t be happy with their start against Carlow.
“We’ve just got to survive this year but one of the big issues we have to sort, is that form away from Corrigan.”
