‘It’s going to take a serious shot to score a penalty now,’ says Cody

Both Brian Cody and Eamon O’Shea believe the odds are stacked against penalty takers converting penalties after Seamus Callanan and John O’Dwyer both had efforts saved yesterday.

As a result of a new interpretation earlier this season, all penalties and 20m frees have to be taken before or on the 20m line whereas before, players had been permitted to lift them beyond the line.

The measure was introduced as a result of Anthony Nash and others’ ability to lift the ball several metres forward. And while Pa Horgan and Joe Canning managed to convert penalties and a 20m free after it was introduced, the conversion rate has dropped remarkably since.

Callanan appeared to mis-hit his penalty in the 22nd minute and it was easily dealt with by Eoin Murphy, while O’Dwyer saw a better shot also denied by the Kilkenny goalkeeper.

Surprisingly, Cody was more expansive on the issue. “It’s obviously more difficult than it used to be, that’s for sure. It’s going to take a serious shot now to score it, that’s for certain.”

O’Shea remarked they had an impact: “Probably, yeah, in terms of say the end result or else we have to get better at taking them is the other side of the coin.”

On the performance of Barry Kelly, Cody said he felt a couple of decisions were harsh such as the lack of a free for Eoin Larkin in the 16th minute and the foul given against Brian Hogan for John O’Dwyer’s last-gasp free.

“I thought it might have been for us, to be honest,” he said of the call against Hogan when he clashed with Pádraic Maher. “I presumed it was for us but, look it, it wasn’t. If it had gone over the bar it was their game, end of story, so thanks be to God it didn’t.”

On the Larkin decision, he said: “Yeah, definitely that time. I’m sure if you looked at the other side they were animated as well.”

Cody felt the umpire should have been able to decide that O’Dwyer’s free had gone wide without deferring to Hawk-Eye. It was one of three Hawk-Eye decisions. “It depends on what the umpire was going to do, whether he was going to signal a point or a wide. You’d be thinking he’s clever enough to signal it a wide since it was a wide but I don’t know. Obviously, it was a huge decision so it was definitive at least.”