Anthony Daly: Clare and Cork just have creases to iron but Cats in huge bother
William Buckley of Cork is congratulated by manager Ben O'Connor. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
On what felt and looked like the first day of the summer, I wasn’t out in the baking heat of Ennis or Thurles yesterday but up in a studio in Montrose in
Of course you’d always prefer to be watching the action live than looking at it on a big screen, but there are a lot of advantages as a pundit and analyst in being in a studio. Because you’re completely detached from all the emotion.
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You can certainly withdraw yourself, especially when your own county are playing. I got multiple texts from Clare people giving out about the referee but I honestly thought that Shane Hynes had a decent game. Would I have thought as much if I was in Cusack Park with all the Clare fans baying at the ref when he awarded a raft of frees to Waterford in the second half? Maybe not.
I certainly wouldn’t have had the benefit of a big screen in front of me and unlimited replays. I can appreciate that now after so much experience in that position, but I wondered what it must have felt like for Patrick Horgan beside me on his maiden championship spin – especially when Cork were missing frees to beat the band. They missed seven in total.
“If you were there,” I turned to Hoggie at one stage “this match would be over.”
Cork just need to tidy up that stuff but they got so much right yesterday, especially their defensive structure. The Downey brothers were excellent. Mark Coleman had a fine game.
Tipp just couldn’t get past that half-back line in the second half but the most revealing stat that underlined the comparative levels of intensity between both teams was the turnover numbers from between half-time to the 65th minute, which was 18-10 in Cork’s favour. That effectively told the story of that half – and the match.
The highlight for me was the performances of Cork’s two debutants, William Buckley – who was a deserved man-of-the-match – and Barry Walsh.
They got 0-9 between them, which was nearly a third of Cork’s scores. On top of that, both – especially Buckley – were centrally involved in the creation of a rake more scores too.
This was a huge win for Cork in the context of last year’s All-Ireland final defeat but there wasn’t any massive fanfare evident in the aftermath either.
Cork fans did go onto the pitch afterwards looking for autographs and selfies but the jingoism that got out of hand last year has certainly been reined in since the All-Ireland final.
It was the perfect win for Cork. Is everything solved? No.
As well as the missed frees, they made a few other basic errors. They need to get more quality ball into Alan Connolly and Brian Hayes but they did go more direct as the game progressed.
Tipp got a run on them late on but Cork never panicked and saw the match out.
Tipp will be disappointed but this performance looked to me like they’d done a lot of cramming to get right for this exam. Given that a lot of lads had missed a lot of the league, maybe they did too much in the build-up and I thought they looked a bit jaded and leggy.
There’s plenty for Tipp to ponder but it’s the same for Clare and Waterford. It was a completely different game in Ennis. Clare will be thrilled to have two points in the bag but they’ll wonder how they were hanging on in additional time before Shane Meehan finally put the contest to bed.
Clare could have scored more goals. They would have only for an outstanding display from Billy Nolan. On the otherhand, Waterford could have had six or seven goals. Clare looked very impressive from numbers 8-15 but there are huge concerns at the back.
You can’t play from behind, which Clare were doing way too much, a lot of which led to frees. Clare were too hesitant. Stephen Bennett was outstanding but it was unforgiveable for Clare to allow him to get such leeway for two of those goals where he was basically untouched.
Seán Walsh had a lot to do for the fourth goal but he was able to run into an ocean of space without being tracked. The other three goals stemmed from Clare not dealing with high balls.
Just not good enough. It is a worry but Clare have two weeks now to iron out those creases. Waterford have only a week before Tipp come to town but they’re still in a decent place and they showed enough yesterday to suggest that they’ll give Tipp enough of it down there.
I was really impressed with Galway on Saturday – as I have been all spring – but this was another horror show from Kilkenny. I genuinely think they’ll have it all to do now to make it into the top three, which would have been unthinkable for Kilkenny after last year’s All-Ireland semi-final.
John Donnelly’s red card was a real worry for me because it hinted at how all over the place they were. Kilkenny were already down to 14 men with Mikey Carey on a black card.
They just needed to stay in the contest early in the second half before surrendering all that to Donnelly’s rashness.
It may have been unintentional. John is a real team-player but that’s what makes it so worrying for Derek Lyng. It kind of summed up the lack of control associated with the group when the one thing we always associated with Kilkenny was control and composure under extreme pressure.
The loss of Huw Lawlor was again evident but there is very little cohesiveness in Kilkenny’s play.
It may have taken Wexford until the second half to see off a gallant Kildare on Saturday but they’re going into Nowlan Park now on Saturday with the scent of blood in their nostrils and the chance to do what they’d love by effectively putting Kilkenny up against the wall and on the brink.Offaly-Dublin was a really entertaining contest in Tullamore.
Offaly will be sickened not to have won. Dublin will be disappointed with how they played but they still got a draw when there were plenty of times in recent years when Dublin would have lost that match. The composure they showed late on – especially Donal Burke – is a huge plus.
Offaly will takes loads of positives too but this was another endorsement of the talent and quality in the group. We didn’t see that in the league but they’ll be hugely encouraged by how they performed on Saturday.
The key now is to learn and drive on. After round one though, every side is thinking that way.
