Selection snubs to spur treble-chasing Rebels
Far from being anti-Cork, they've revealed themselves as Rebel fellow travellers.
Just as every intercounty hurler outside Cork was wondering about the Leesiders' appetite for a three-in-a-row, yesterday's All Star selection provided the ideal goad for John Allen's men. When the lonely, freezing fields of Carrigtwohill and Ballygarvan are approached for stamina training this winter the Cork side will have the perfect motivation: to right the sins of omission suffered in particular by the man who drives them on and the man they all grew up worshipping. That Cork play Clare in their first outing in the Munster championship just adds to the spice. On a more serious note, the indignation is a tad misplaced. The Allstars has always been a matter of accommodation and facilitation. Players are being slotted into positions that are alien to them.
The difference this time is in favouring Davy Fitzgerald over Donal Óg Cusack, which does look strange. Cusack played in more big games than Fitzgerald, and played better. On the biggest stage, the All-Ireland final, he did as well as any keeper could have, saving Cork from two certain goals and stopping the initial effort that led to Galway's goal, for which he was unanimously exonerated. His stop from Alan Kerins is a contender for save of the year, as is his Munster final penalty save from Tipperary's Eoin Kelly; he also saved a point in the All-Ireland final.
Davy Fitzgerald didn't have quite the same year, having slipped with Clare into the qualifiers after Tipperary overran them in Limerick. Most people will recall the games in Croke Park, a blowout against Wexford and the clash with Cork, when his defenders kept Cork's goal chances to a minimum.
In a direct comparison between the pair in that game, Cusack's performance was better. His high-risk puck-out strategy didn't suffer the way Fitzgerald's did; the Clareman continued to rain the ball down on Cork's rejigged half-back line of Mulcahy, Gardiner and Ó hAilpín in the second half. In the high-stakes poker of a one-point All-Ireland semi-final, Gardiner's calm fetch of one of those clearances and point was a killer, as our hurling analyst Tony Considine pointed out in yesterday's Arena. When Cusack changed his puck-out strategy it was to devastating effect against Galway.
At least the Cork keeper can console himself with a like-for-like selection. Imagine if you were Micheál Webster this morning. All summer you're feted as the Premier's saviour, the route one option that Tipp can use - and did, to some effect, in several games - but according to the selectors you're not even the best full-forward in your own team.
There isn't going to be a stand-out option in every position. That goes without saying. But there does appear to be a double standard for some positions.
Some appear to be made on the basis of 'the best of a bad lot' when the performances of players in that specific jersey are weighed up; other positions don't seem as important. Full-forward, for instance, doesn't seem to be recognised as a slot with certain demands and requirements so much as a loose posting near goal. Webster's muscular drive this season deserved recognition. So did that embodiment of physical spearhead and deft goalscorer, Brian Corcoran. However, the sign on the door suggest no number 14s need apply.
But the omission of Cusack is sure to be the controversy at the water-cooler this morning.
It's good news for Cork; after all, you could ask the new Tipp manager about the Leeside propensity to take the perception of a slight and amplify it to the status of a rallying call. Now the Rebel hurlers can identify an anti-Cork slur to avenge in 2006.
As we said. A masterstroke.
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