Revitalised Rebels star O’Neill has goals in mind

Cork’s Colm O’Neill is eager to make up for lost time by scoring more goals in 2014.

On Sunday against Tyrone, O’Neill raised his first green flag for the county since the 2012 All-Ireland semi-final loss to Donegal. In between, he has had to recuperate from a third cruciate ligament injury, but now he is fit again, he intends to make the most of it. His second-half strike put Cork three points up, and though they were held to a draw, they have still qualified for the semi-finals.

“Andrew O’Sullivan hand-passed me the ball,” O’Neill said, “I beat my man and was one-on-one, so I just hit it.

“Thankfully it went in. I was getting a bit of slagging from the lads, it was nearly about time I started getting goals again. Hopefully there’ll be a few more down the line.!”

Having made his return to action off the bench against Dublin, the defeat to Mayo was the only game O’Neill has started this year. He is now ready to take a starting spot, but accepts there is strong competition for places.

“I’d feel I’m at full fitness,” he said, “I’d think to myself sometimes that maybe I’m shooting myself in the foot doing so well coming off the bench!

“The challenge for me now is to nail down a starting position. It’s clear to see that the competition among the forwards and all over the field is good.

“It’s very much a 20, 23-man game now. Even with the black cards, fellas are going to get opportunities. The pace of the game has got so high, fellas find it very hard to last 70 minutes.

“It’s very important for us to have a strong panel, having five or six players to come off the bench and make an impact. That was there to see against Tyrone.”

For that to be the case is a sign of how well manager Brian Cuthbert has done, according to O’Neill.

“In fairness to Brian, he has brought in a lot of new lads but everyone is buying into it,” he said.

“There is a great camaraderie within the team and it’s going to take a few games for fellas to step up, but I think the younger players have acquitted themselves very well. It’s good going forward into the league semi-final.”

Tyrone will also be in the last four if they beat Dublin in Omagh next week. Seán Cavanagh believes Tyrone will be heartened by the manner in which they earned a draw on Leeside.

“You have to, it’s reminiscent of the Kildare game [which Tyrone won],” he said. It’s good to know you have that bottle and resilience. We lost a lot of tight games last year. You need to be in games like that to get used to getting over the line. It’s nice to come away with an unlikely draw.”

When Cork went four points up in the second half, Cavanagh was worried about a repeat of the defeat to Kerry.

“It was one thing we spoke about at half-time,” he said. “It was similar conditions, a wintry wet day. We started to get a few scares, particularly when they got the goal. Having the likes of Conor [Gormley], Martin Penrose and that to bring in helped stem the tide. They have a bit of steel and it changed the flow of the game a wee bit.”

Now, the task is to beat the reigning All-Ireland champions. “If we can bring the last seven or eight minutes of our intensity today to that game, it’ll be great. It’s a big thing to be playing the All-Ireland champions. They came up to us in 2006 with some ferocious play to turn us over as All-Ireland champions. Dublin are always a big ticket, it’ll be a massive game.”