Ian O'Riordan talks to Offaly manager Padraig Nolan, who knows his side must avoid a poor start again tomorrow

Without making a long story short, Offaly manager Padraig Nolan reckons his team will have to improve in all areas for tomorrow's Leinster semi-final replay against Kildare. Though Vinny Claffey's late equaliser at Nowlan Park last Sunday could just as easily have been a late winner, Offaly were under-performing for long stretches of the game.

"We definitely don't want to give Kildare another eight-point lead," says Nolan. "I was encouraged by the way we finished so well but there's no way we can afford to let ourselves play so poorly again from the start because we've no chance of winning if we do."

Nolan has delayed naming his team for the trip back to Kilkenny until later today, but changes are expected. Claffey is likely to get a starting place after ultimately keeping Offaly in the Leinster championship, and it will be little surprise either to see Finbar Cullen reverting from centre forward to centre back, where he finished the last day.

But changes were clearly necessary on the field last Sunday once Kildare jumped into a 1-6 to 0-1 lead at half-time. In truth, not many of the Offaly players could be forgiven for the staleness of the performance, with Kildare taking every advantage they got.

"Well I certainly wasn't surprised with Kildare's performance. They were just as good as I thought they would be and I know they'll be thinking they can improve as well.

"But we're going back to Kilkenny knowing what we have to do. The conditions were poor the last day but that's no excuse. In fact I thought the pitch was in superb condition considering all the rain we had that day. Hopefully though, the conditions will be a little better next time."

At least Nolan's team won't have the distraction of the World Cup this time. The Irish-Spain shoot-out in Seoul was broadcast on the team bus en route to Kilkenny and clearly the players' focus would have been tested.

Nolan admits too it hasn't been easy to prepare the team for the replay in just six days. The exertions of playing under the winter-like conditions left the team physically drained, and a number of them with injuries.

Requiring treatment throughout the week were defenders John Kenny (hamstring), Barry Mooney (ankle) and Karol Slattery (hip), midfielders Seán Grennan (groin) and Ciarán McManus (gashed shin), as well as Claffey (calf).

Though McManus's shin injury wasn't as bad as it looked after Sunday's game, there is a problem too with James Grennan (who replaced his older brother Seán for the closing 18 minutes last Sunday), who is suffering from bronchitis

There is some consolation in that whichever team loses tomorrow will get a two-week break rather than one for their second-round qualifier game with Limerick. With the Limerick hurlers set the play on June 29th, the football qualifier was put back until July 6th because of the dual-player conflicts.

Last year Offaly learned the hard way of the problem of rising again after losing the Leinster semi-final. A week after falling to Dublin they crashed to Louth by just a point, and so began the long and lamented summer break.