We never got out of the blocks: Joey Boland

Dublin hurlers Joey Boland is determined and convinced that Ger Cunningham's men can bounce back from last Saturday's Leinster SHC quarter-final replay defeat to Galway.

“It's hard to put the finger on it. We didn't get out of the blocks. They got the couple of goals early on and it was very hard to turn the tide after that. There is a lot of soul-searching going on in our set-up at the moment as you can probably understand. Fair play to Galway, they came out and hit the ground running and we just had no answer to it.

“They got to the bounce of the ball quicker than us at the start. That is championship hurling. You just have to get to the bounce of the ball quick.

“Galway had our number and they really did exploit the space very, very well. We just didn't win the battle around the middle," added the Na Fianna man.

“In my opinion, and for a lot of the players, obviously we're very hurt with it, (but) there is not that much wrong.

“We know that if we get that three per cent or two per cent the other side of the fence then there is a huge shift. At the end of the day there was five goals and three of them were very, very soft.”