Reducing Brick effect key to win
I WROTE on Saturday that Liam Sheedy would have to have his plans to negate Michael Walsh put into practice rather than just being preached.
Placing Noel McGrath on the 40 was his first ploy and crucially, his half-backs and midfielders sought McGrath out at every opportunity. McGrath’s an accomplished hurler and, more importantly, he’s a highly flexible forward in the positional rather than the physical sense. Long-range scores are well within his compass and by executing the pre-game plan to feed him with accurate ball, Tipp were well on track.
With five points from play on the board from centre-forward, he managed more from play than the entire Cork forward line scored in the first halves of the Munster final and replay.
With one fell swoop the strength of Michael Walsh, so potent in Munster, was diluted as he had to adopt a more man-marking role than he would have liked.
Effectively the defensive lines that Waterford had employed against Cork were broken and channels were opened in their vulnerable full-back line with Lar Corbett doing a lot of damage.
Yesterday proved once again that a plan is needed for battle – and that the plan needs to be executed. Tipp did well on that score.
WATERFORD boss Davy Fitzgerald gambled on the selection of young Brian O’Halloran at full-forward yesterday instead of the experienced Seamus Prendergast or Ken McGrath.
These gambles rarely work and Tipp’s full-back Paul Curran completely dominated the area in front of the goal.
He thundered on to 50-50 ball and was tidy and economical when he needed to be in front of goal.
John Mullane was the only Waterford forward to threaten in the first half and had the close-marking Tipp back Paddy Stapleton in trouble any time the ball was delivered between them. However, I wrote on Saturday that a better scoring return was needed from the Waterford forwards, particularly Eoin Kelly, but this didn’t materialise.
Tipp’s right-half-back Declan Fanning sat back on his 45 metre line, while Kelly went deep, but the Waterford half-back line sent a lot of crossfield ball which went straight to Fanning, who cleared without any real pressure.
Waterford’s half-back line were harried by the quick-tackling Tipp forwards, and they were unable to create a platform to launch attacks as they did against Cork.
Nine of Waterford’s scores came from placed balls and their goal, flicked home by the hard-running Eoin McGrath near the end, came too late to change the course of events.
Tipp were just too strong, though Liam Sheedy will be concerned by the concession of needless frees.
THE main difference between these two sides was in their respective scoring power.
Tipp scored 3-15 from play with John O’Brien scoring 0-6, Lar Corbett 1-2 and Eoin Kelly 2-1 – all from play.
Tipp broke Waterford by using Shane McGrath, Lar Corbett and Noel McGrath to run at the Waterford defence. With Tipp’s half-back line in command, they had plenty of possession and looked far more comfortable than their opponents.
Brendan Cummins used a short puck-out all through and Tipp defenders Paddy Stapleton, Michael Cahill and Padraic Maher made good use of this easily-won possession.
Waterford allowed Tipp to take those short puck-outs by withdrawing out the field and never really challenged for those balls.
This was a mistake as it gave quality possession to Tipp and no moves were made by the Waterford sideline to pressure Cummins into hitting less successful long-range puck-outs. Tip won two huge battles as well, with Noel McGrath’s 0-5 from play a great return from centre-forward.
Psychologically it damaged the aura of invincibility which Brick Walsh had brought through from the Munster championship.
Also, Noel Connors was at full-back in a man-marking role on Eoin Kelly but this proved unsuccessful – a lot more questions were asked of Waterford’s defence by the Premier in Croke Park than were posed by Cork in Thurles.
