Dubs in danger of Cats mauling

Dublin 1-17 Wexford 0-12

Ultimately, however, the extra-man advantage the home side enjoyed from the 9th minute (Wexford centre-back Andrew Shore, blinded by the low sun, red-carded for a careless strike on Ryan O’Dwyer) meant that even misfiring as badly as they did, Dublin still had plenty to spare over an equally malfunctioning Wexford 14.

Not that Dublin manager Anthony Daly was unduly bothered by his side’s performance. “It’s an eight-point win in the quarter-final of the Leinster championship, our fourth time playing Wexford this year and we haven’t lost once. If someone had told me four years ago that would happen I’d have said they were gone off the rails. So, what other positives you can take from an eight-point win? Make up your own mind and give your own assessment.”

That assessment is stark — if Dublin play like that against Kilkenny in the semi-final, they’ll be blown off the park. Worse, they now have only a week to ready themselves for that game, in Portlaoise on Sunday, and given the very physical nature of Wexford’s challenge last week and this, much of that time will be spent in recovery.

“A few lads are sore in there, a few stitches and that,” Daly admitted. “We’ll try and freshen up now during the week. You’ll have the apes who’ll say we’d have been better off to have lost and gone the other way (the qualifiers, and a home meeting with Antrim, the fate that now awaits Wexford on Saturday in Wexford Park) but I don’t think like that. Championship hurling is about trying to get a win and that’s the way we went at it.”

Dublin won the toss and impressive captain John McCaffrey opted to play with the strong wind. It proved a wise decision as Dublin led 1-9 to 0-4 at the break, their goal coming in the 13th minute after full-forward Paul Ryan capitalised on a good centre by Conal Keaney and an error by Eoin Moore to beat Mark Fanning.

Wexford coped well initially with the loss of Shore but in the final ten minutes of the half it began to take its toll, four unanswered points giving the Dubs that eight-point half-time cushion.

On the restart Wexford again initially made light of their numerical disadvantage and with the wind now at their backs, by the 48th minute had reduced the deficit, two frees by youngster Jack Guiney and a fine point from midfielder Harry Kehoe left them 1-10 to 0-7 behind.

Then came probably Dublin’s finest spell, four points in four minutes (one each from the outstanding Keaney, Danny Sutcliffe, McCaffrey and David Treacy) putting them 10 clear with 15 minutes remaining.

To their credit Wexford kept battling, made yet another run at the hosts, but an eight-point final difference was just about right.

Daly said he was “reasonably happy” but agreed that the “Kilkenny mentors won’t be shaking in their boots going home. All we can do is be the best we can be next week and see what we can get out of it. We couldn’t look beyond this game but we have the week now to get our heads around it (facing the Cats). Kilkenny at their best, we know how great they can be. We must hope they have an off-day and we have a right good day, that’s the best we can hope for. It’s a daunting task but what are you in it for but to try and better yourself and kick on.”

As for Wexford, they’re still in the All-Ireland race via the back-door. “It’s hard enough trying to beat Dublin with 15 men but it makes it a little bit more difficult when you have 14. We’ll dust ourselves down and we have Antrim next week in Wexford Park.”

Wexford did have one goal opportunity in the second half, captain Gareth Sinnott denied by a superbly-timed flick off his stick by Dublin keeper Gary Maguire (Wexford keeper Mark Fanning then made a brilliant save from Paul Ryan at the other end).

Had that Wexford goal been scored, who knows? “We got one opportunity, that was it,” said Dunne. “At this level you have to be able to take them. We didn’t take that goal opportunity. But I can’t say anything bad about our fellas, they put in a performance as best they could. They were under pressure from the very start. Fair play to Dublin – they deserved their win. We’ve had two seriously good games against a top four or five team in Ireland. That’s where we want to be and they’re the teams we want to play. I’d prefer to be going to Nowlan Park next week (to play Kilkenny) but we’ll take Wexford Park as well.”

Scorers for Dublin: P Ryan (1-9, seven frees, one 65); J McCaffrey (0-2); C Keaney (0-2); D Treacy (0-2); D Sutcliffe and P Kelly (0-1 each).

Scorers for Wexford: J Guiney (0-5, five frees); G Sinnott (0-2); P Morris (0-2); R Jacob, H Kehoe and P Doran (0-1 each).

Subs: S Durkin for P Shutte (35); D O’Callaghan for McCormack (43); S Lambert for Rushe (60); M Schutte for Treacy (63); N McMorrow for Sutcliffe (68). Blood sub: D O’Callaghan for Keaney (35/half-time).

Subs: P Doran for Redmond (42); C O’Shaughnessy for Quigley (42); M O’Regan for H Kehoe (64); G Moore for Jacob (69).

Referee: B Gavin (Offaly).