Patrick Kelly: The road is long and hard, but I think this Cork group will make strides

Cork must only look to the other red and white team in Croke Park on Saturday for inspiration. Just three years ago the Oak Leaf County had slipped to Division 4 football, now they are only 70 minutes away from an All-Ireland final

CROWDED HOUSE: Cork’s Brian Hurley with Jonny Cooper and Eoin Murchan of Dublin in Saturday's All-Ireland SFC quarter-final at Croke Park. Picture: INPHO/Evan Treacy

A statistic to start off with; Cork’s combined first half tally against Kerry and Dublin this summer reads: scored 14, conceded 19. Not bad considering the opposition. However, the second half combined tally tells the full story; Cork scored seven points, conceded 25 points. Where did it all go wrong? Conditioning is too easy an out, tactics play a big part.

After conceding nine goals across seven division two league games, which included a goal in every game, Cork’s response was to employ Seán Powter as a sweeper to occupy the D and eliminate the threat of goals for the championship campaign. Indeed, it is bizarre that in 11 competitive games Cork played this year they only kept a clean sheet twice; against Kerry and Dublin. The big difference in those two games was that Cork sacrificed an attacker and essentially played with seven full-time defenders. The knock-on effect is huge, and I’ll try to explain why.