Rebels were fired up while Cats were missing top gear
Cork’s workrate all over the field was the foundation for this victory.
From the word go, Cork’s Daniel Kearney at midfield, and, up front, Seamus Harnedy, showed great leadership. Kearney’s direct running, in particular, at the Kilkenny defence put the black and amber defenders under severe pressure. Harnedy’s tackling ability was another huge Cork asset.
As was Cork’s half-back line, as a whole, in particular William Egan, who gave a great display, mopping up any loose ball in their area.
Patrick Cronin played very intelligently — he dropped deep into his own midfield and half-back line and provided many telling passes as his marker, Tommy Walsh, remained in his right-half-back position.
Jamie Coughlan, who started at centre-forward, showed his intelligence by leaving his position to drop into midfield at the correct time to pick up excellent passes from Kearney and the Cork half-backs, scoring one inspirational long-range point in the first half.
Cork used the ball well, transferring it from line to line, and Patrick Horgan was on song, giving Kilkenny full-back JJ Delaney a torrid time. Crucially for Cork, Shane O’Neill, who had been doubtful until Friday evening, gave a great display, covering well across the full-back line. Stephen McDonnell had a good outing in the right corner and made a vital block near the end of the first half to deprive Walter Walsh a goalscoring opportunity, as a fired-up Cork put their bodies on the line from left-corner-forward back the field.
Kilkenny, on the other hand, looked a little off in the first half.
They used three different free-takers. Eoin Larkin had two misses, Richie Power hit two 65s wide and even Henry Shefflin missed a very scoreable free by his own standards, though he seemed to argue that the ball had gone over the bar. I was a little surprised to see Shefflin selected as he looked off the pace against Waterford and I thought he might be held over as an impact sub for the second half. Cillian Buckley on one wing and Shefflin on the left made no impression on their markers. No forward scored from play in the first half apart from Larkin’s early point. They went 18 minutes in the middle of the half without scoring, and it was left to corner-back Paul Murphy to drive upfield with a puck-out and hit a fine point.
Henry Shefflin, who had picked up an early yellow card, received a second yellow when he tackled Jamie Coughlan around the neck, and he was duly sent off to the annoyance of the Kilkenny supporters. One could argue that the first yellow was a little harsh. However, Shefflin is a player of immense experience and he showed poor judgment in going in to tackle Coughlan, who wasn’t really threatening at the time. In the second half, Kilkenny came out with a vigour that was absent in the first period. Lester Ryan brought a distinct improvement for them and gave them momentum in midfield, and they forced a penalty just after the break.
Richie Power hit a fantastic shot to the net — but it was called back as Tommy Walsh and numerous defenders were already well inside the large parallelogram. Anthony Nash, the Cork keeper, made a superb save from the retaken penalty, and when Lorcan McLoughlin kept out the rebound from Tommy Walsh — one felt then it was Cork’s day.
Cork advance now to an All-Ireland semi-final against Dublin, who were ultra-impressive in the Leinster final. No doubt the Cork management will take a good look at the DVD of that game and of their own game yesterday in Thurles.
They couldn’t fault the workrate of their players and manager Jimmy Barry-Murphy and coach Ger Cunningham will be well satisfied with a lot of the tactical play.
However, in the second half Cork hit a lot of long ball into their attack which favoured the Kilkenny backs. Cork were best served when they moved the ball sharply, 30 or 40 metres at a time, direct to their attackers. This helped to improve the play of Conor Lehane and Luke O’Farrell which will be a confidence boost for the semi-final.
O’Farrell got plenty of possession and won his battle with teak-tough Jackie Tyrrell convincingly. However, he didn’t always take the correct option and hit some wides when crossing to a colleague would have been a better option. Lehane did much better in this game than in the Munster final and the U21 game against Tipperary. He worked hard and was unfortunate that one or two balls didn’t stick when he was through for certain scores.
Anthony Nash made a fine stop from Michael Fennelly near the end which allowed Cork weather the Cats’ comeback.
It was 15-man Cork against 14-man Kilkenny all through the second half, and with such high fitness levels, the extra man makes a difference — Conor O’Sullivan played this role very well. This was an exciting victory savoured by the huge Cork support, who rose in unison to JBM and his players at the final whistle. However, management won’t be carried away before the semi-final. Another huge test.
