Dublin make everyone sit up and pay attention
That was how it was in Croke Park yesterday. And people were talking in glowing terms, not about the quality of the hurling, which was poor enough, but about the spirit, heart and commitment of Dublin.
In the third minute when Lar Corbett had the ball in the Dublin net, people were nodding knowingly to one another in the stands. Yes this was going to go the way everyone feared and a rout was on the cards.
But what happened?
Dublin took the game to Tipperary and did so in style. Their play was intelligent, their physicality was fierce. They weren’t waiting for things to happen, they were being creative and taking Tipperary on.
Several of their players were outstanding, but none greater than the man whose handling error allowed Corbett his goal chance, Peter Kelly. He may be only a stand-in at full-back but he gave an exhibition and must be in line for an All Star. Joey Boland was another man in blue who caught my eye, as did Niall Corcoran and Shane Durkin, while captain John McCaffrey did a lot of unseen dirty work. Liam Rushe was another who impressed as did Dotsy O’Callaghan and Paul Ryan. Every one of the Dublin players yesterday put in a full shift but those guys especially.
Playing some really good hurling, Dublin actually took the lead for a good period of the first half and the same people who had predicted a landslide after those opening minutes now had to sit up and pay attention.
Several of the Tipp players of whom so much was expected weren’t performing, or weren’t let perform, to put it more accurately. The sight of four forwards along with one midfielder being replaced tells its own story. Were it not for their defence, with Paul Curran and Conor O’Mahony shoring up the middle, and the man I have in line for Hurler of the Year, Pádraic Maher, Tipperary would have been in real trouble. Another man who played well for them was Michael Cahill, in the sweeper role.
Level pegging at half time, I’d like to have been a fly on the wall in the Tipp dressing-room to hear what Declan Ryan was going to say to his team but, equally, I’d like to have been in with Anthony Daly and Dublin also. Remember, this was a Dublin team that was supposed to have been heading home at half time yet here they were putting it up to the All-Ireland champions.
Tipperary returned with a new-look team in the second half, and I thought there was an extra pep in their step.
Where they had been the ones waiting for things to fall into place in the first half, now they began to work a bit harder to make things happen. And it did start to happen for them, if very slowly, with Noel McGrath starting to come more and more into the game, having barely hit a ball in the first half. Dublin, meanwhile, were now living on scraps as Curran and O’Mahony began to dominate in that Tipperary defence.
The problem Dublin had at this stage was that having lined out so defensively, they were always going to struggle for the scores needed to win this game. They did go six on six up front for the final 10 minutes or so, but still lacked the penetration to break that Tipp backline. Oh, what they’d have given for Conal Keaney in those final minutes!
So, Tipperary go through, and showed the character of champions. It’s easy to win a game when your attack is scoring seven goals, as they did against Waterford in the Munster final, but this was a different kind of game and though they were well tested, Tipperary still had enough for the win.
They go into the All-Ireland final with a lot of question marks hanging over them, the midfield and attack especially, but then Brian Cody has the same problems in Kilkenny, which sets us up for an interesting few weeks.
Dublin? I know they’ll be disappointed they lost this game, and they should be, but they can’t look on this as any kind of moral victory. Where Dublin go from here is the biggest question of all from yesterday. Anthony Daly must stay with them — in fact I’d say if he joined the race for the Áras he’d be nearly guaranteed the Dublin vote anyway! They must push on though.
We have the All-Ireland final most predicted at the start of the year, one to look forward to, but not in the manner everyone thought it would happen.
Maybe Tipperary and Kilkenny aren’t as far ahead of the chasing pack as we thought.
