Clare outfight and outfox Cork
But, on Saturday night, Clare were the ones producing the bubbly with an incredible second-half performance to claim victory.
Clare notched 1-15 to Cork’s 1-4 in this second-half giving the home side a lesson in tactical play and application. Cork were outfought and crucially out-thought in this highly impressive second-half display by Davy Fitzgerald’s men. On the balance of first-half play Cork’s lead should have been more than five points but Clare supporters can also rightly argue their men hit 11 wides. Cork shot nine wides before the break, missing five easy point chances, the final one in particular a very casual strike from Patrick Horgan while Stephen Moylan spurned a great goal chance.
However, the game changed utterly on the changeover.
Clare’s second-half performance was based on high fitness, work rate, tactical awareness and a cohesion that Cork couldn’t match. Clare’s tactics were clear. They left one or two forwards at most inside Cork’s 45m line and funnelled back bodies into midfield and defence.
Cork’s defence was dominant in the first-half but even then they failed to serve up the type of accurate ball needed to open Clare up. Throughout the game Cork’s defenders played long ball down the field — which led to bunching and was easily defended — instead of shorter accurate deliveries to put players in good possession.
This was in contrast to Clare, who always looked for better placed colleagues. The visiting half back line took over in the second-half, hoovering up the long ball and the dominant Pat Donnellan and wing men Brendan Bugler and Pat O’Connor were constantly putting forward colleagues in possession with clever play to the wings.
They swallowed up Cork’s puck outs but, incredibly, keeper Anthony Nash never really varied the length of his deliveries. Midfielders Nicky O’Connell and Conor Ryan worked tirelessly throughout winning their battle comfortably while centre forward Tony Kelly was given the freedom to bring his quality skills into play. In this second half his movement and positioning caused all sorts of problems for the Rebels, knocking over three points from play, with one beauty from long range nine minutes from time. The Cork management made no efforts to counteract Kelly’s dominance or to curb left half forward Colin Ryan who scored three points from play.
Defensively Cork’s half backline were pulled apart and their wing backs might have benefited from a switch. The home side’s half forwards could have been instructed to lie deeper towards midfield, flooding it with bodies and providing cover for the half backs. By doing so Clare’s task of finding their men from defence would have been more difficult and more space would have been available for Cork’s inside forwards. This would also have allowed the Cork half backline to hold a defensive line 50 metres from goal rather than following their men too far out the field as Clare wanted them to do. The huge gap between themselves and the full-back line allowed Fergal Lynch to set up Shane O’Donnell for Clare’s goal with Cork’s full-back Brian Murphy uncharacteristically caught out. On this evidence Cork need captain Pa Cronin up front as their half forward line aren’t forceful enough. There’s much to ponder for Jimmy-Barry Murphy after this display while there’s much satisfaction from second half excellence for Clare fans and manager Fitzgerald.
