Patricia O’Grady will evaluate her position as manager of the Clare senior camogie team.
A former goalkeeper with the county side, O’Grady concluded her third year in charge of the side with a two point home defeat to Waterford which was the Déise’s second ever senior championship win on Sunday.
First appointed to the role following Colm Honan’s resignation at the end of the 2015 season, Patricia had previously been a selector with Honan and John Carmody prior to that. Clare reached the quarter-finals in 2014 but have failed to make the knockout stages since.
During her tenure, the Newmarket-on-Fergus woman has added several young players to the panel, many of which have progressed from the minor ranks. Clare had a panel of thirty players for the Waterford game, nineteen of them were recruited to the senior panel by O’Grady. However several experienced players had left the panel in Honan’s final year and former captain Kate Lynch was one of the notable departures during O’Grady’s reign.
This year her management team was comprised of Denise Lynch, Flan McInerney, Martin Conlon, Gerry O’Halloran and Brian Enright. Patricia and Enright worked side by side with Newmarket as part of the victorious management teams that led the Blues to glory in the 2007 Minor Hurling Championship plus the back to back Senior Camogie Championship winning teams of 2010 and 2011. Lynch became a selector last year following her inter-county retirement in 2016.
Following the defeat to Waterford in Cusack Park, Patricia declined to speak with members of the print media. However she has since outlined that the 2018 management team will sit down to evaluate their current and future positions.
Photograph: ©INPHO/Laszlo Geczo