Seasoned Mayo respond as time called on Cork
For the victors, too close for comfort. For the vanquished, not nearly enough.
Mayo were the superior outfit but the 37,786 in Croke Park were kept in suspense too long to be convinced All-Ireland champions were seen yesterday.
Cork, on the other hand, went some way to convincing themselves and their skimpy following that the awfulness of July 6 was a figment of their imagination.
With 19 minutes remaining, Mayo were seven points to the good and daring to dream of breaking Kerry hoodoos.
That was part of their problem: they had tuned out while Cork, sensing a lack of focus in their opponents after being hit hard at the start of the second half, tuned in.
In 12 minutes, Mayo’s advantage disappeared. The introduction of stalwart Donncha O’Connor added plenty to the Cork attack and they reeled off 1-4 without reply.
After a Fintan Goold score in the 52nd minute, O’Connor was the only scorer for the next 11 minutes, helping himself to a point from play, two frees and then a 63rd minute goal after he was put through by James Loughrey.
A Cillian O’Connor free bridged a 13-minute gap to Mayo’s last score, another O’Connor free, to stem the tide coming Mayo’s way.
Aidan O’Shea’s goal in the 66th minute, created by Donal Vaughan and seeing O’Shea round Aidan Walsh and Ken O’Halloran, seemed the perfect breaker only for Cork to go up the field almost immediately and Brian Hurley struck the ball past Rob Hennelly, taking a deflection off Colm Boyle along the way.
Cork’s deficit returned to a solitary point but then Donal Vaughan and Lee Keegan registered points within a minute.
There was still time for Colm O’Neill to slot over two injury-time frees. The latter O’Neill sent over the bar after the allocated two minutes following consultation with referee Cormac Reilly. He was of the understanding there was enough on the clock to score an equaliser or a winner. However, Reilly called time just seconds afterwards.
A frustrated number of Cork players, including O’Neill, approached the referee afterwards but the die was cast, Mayo reaching a fourth All-Ireland semi-final in as many years under James Horan.
“Momentum changed in credibly quickly and Cork got a couple of goals and put us in a tight squeeze,” he said. “Or we put ourselves in a tight squeeze. [We] came back and got one score in particular, I thought was very well worked.
“We were under pressure on one side and changed it over to the other side and I thought we showed great composure to get a couple of key scores at key times.
“Delighted to win a game like that. Performance wasn’t great overall but delighted to come through a tight squeeze.”
In a game full of needle, Mayo had gained a supposed commanding lead thanks to an electric start to the second half when they doubled their first half total of eight points in just 16 minutes.
Forcing Cork’s defenders into cul de sacs, they sent over the first four scores of the half as Andy Moran and Alan Dillon’s leadership shone out.
Cork didn’t post a score until the 44th minute, an O’Neill free after one of several fouls by Tom Cunniffe who escaped the game without a yellow card. It remained their solitary offering of the half until Goold’s point commenced their comeback.
Dillon had a shot saved in the 46th minute but Mayo continued to punish Cork’s edginess on the ball with Moran, notching a second point before he was surprisingly benched, and Dillon again figuring prominently.
“We lost a few kickouts, lost a few breaks,” recalled Brian Cuthbert of Mayo’s purple patch. “They were able to come at us. A lot of things we’d spoken about, we took the ball in to contact too much and they were able to turn us over. They’re very good at that. Once they turn you over, you’re wide open.”
Yet Mayo were, for the majority, kept in check in the opening half, the sides finishing it 0-8 apiece. Thomas Clancy saw black for a deliberate takedown of Aidan O’Shea but Mayo were otherwise restricted to long-range or acute angle points. There was a miscommunication by O’Halloran and Shields in the sixth minute which almost allowed Jason Doherty a freak goal but that was it.
Brian Hurley and O’Neill finished that period with a combined total of six points, Hurley looking sharp having been restored to the full-forward line as Goold was named late to replace Donal Óg Hodnett.
His 16th minute point saw Cork go three up although a brace from Dillon had them pegged back by the interval.
“It was a horrible game to watch from the sidelines, that’s for sure,” said Horan. “We found it hard in the first half. It was a dour enough first half with Cork going so defensive.
“We tried to plot our way through it. In the second half, I thought we opened up and played quite well at times, got a great flow, got four or five points up and had probably two goal chances that we didn’t go for and maybe if we had got one of those it would have finished off the game. But we let Cork back into it and probably maybe tried to watch or mind the score a little bit.”
Ultimately, what they provided was enough but the jury remains hung on them.
Scorers for Mayo: C O’Connor (0-5, 3fs), A Dillon (0-4), A O’Shea (1-0), J Doherty, S O’Shea, A Moran, D Vaughan (0-2 each), K McLoughlin, L Keegan (0-1 each).
Scorers for Cork: B Hurley (1-4, 0-1f), D O’Connor (1-3, 0-2fs), C O’Neill (0-5, 3fs), F Goold (0-2), A Walsh (0-1f).
MAYO: R Hennelly; G Cafferkey, C Barrett, L Keegan; T Cunniffe, C Boyle, K Higgins; A O’Shea, S O’Shea; K McLoughlin, A Dillon, J Doherty; D Vaughan, A Moran, C O’Connor.
Subs for Mayo: M Conroy for K McLoughlin (blood, 14-23), E Varley for A Moran (47), B Harrison for C Barrett (57), A Freeman for C O’Connor (inj 64), J Gibbons for A O’Shea (inj 69), M Conroy for A Dillon (70+3).
CORK: K O’Halloran; N Galvin, E Cadogan, M Shields; B O’Driscoll, T Clancy, J Loughrey; I Maguire, A Walsh; M Collins, F Goold, C O’Driscoll; P Kerrigan, B Hurley, C O’Neill.
Subs for Cork: D Cahalane for T Clancy (black, 20), P Kelly for C O’Driscoll (47), D O’Connor for M Collins (50), J O’Rourke for B O’Driscoll (57), D Goulding for I Maguire (inj 61) J Hayes for A Walsh (70).
Referee: C Reilly (Meath).
