Pat Ryan: 'You have to be able to score 30 points plus now to win games'

'We know we have potential. We’ve had potential for the last four or five years but just haven’t been able to bring it through. It’s about getting that consistency. Everyone can see that on a given day Cork can put in any performance.'

Sun, 19 May, 2024 - 19:39

Therese O’Callaghan

It will be a waiting game for Cork senior hurling manager Pat Ryan as the final round of matches play out next weekend.

They currently sit behind Limerick in second place in the table, but Limerick entertain Waterford and Tipperary host Clare on Sunday.

And no, he won’t be going to Limerick, opting instead to ‘spend some time with the kids.’

“I don’t think there’s any chance we’ll get the top two, the Munster final,” he said.

“I don’t think we’ll be playing til June 15 so we’ll do a gym and recovery session tomorrow, probably train Thursday and we’ll give lads the weekend off, back in the following Monday.

“We’re still a bit disappointed we’re not (qualified). We didn’t deserve it. We’ve played four games, we’ve only got four points, but look, we’ve seen the performances get steadily better. Hopefully we’ll get a rub of the green and we get the third spot but that’s all to be decided.

“We can all see the ability that’s in those players, that’s in that panel, we all know it but in fairness it’s not just me we have a very good management team that are trying to do that. And previous good management teams that put an awful lot of effort into this.

"Diarmuid (O’Sullivan) and Kieran Kingston were here for a long time and put an awful lot of effort into these players. We’re getting the benefits of that there now. Hopefully we’ll get a bit of luck next week and we’ll be into the All-Ireland series.

“Today the fellas went at it, delighted the way our subs went at it. Our 38 players. You lose the first two games, you need fellas to stay united, stay behind you. And they did. They stayed together. We worked really really hard at it and got a great result against Limerick last week.

“Look, this was Cork and Tipp. Fellas would be saying, ‘oh you only have eight days’. If you can’t get up for Cork and Tipp after a day, never mind eight days, you don’t deserve to wear that Cork jersey.

“The fans were right behind us. We’re a big county, Cork. Hurling is a huge thing for them. ’Tis easy for us to get 25,000 if we can get lads off their feet. That win against Limerick the last day and the win today will probably make sure we have a good following going forward.”

Tipperary put it up to Cork with Mark Kehoe’s first minute goal. It didn’t upset their plans.

“We knew Tipperary could do that. they’ve great runners from behind. Conor Bowe got in behind, he normally plays on the right wing but he was playing on the left, we kind of got caught with that. Created a great goalscoring opportunity. Our lads settled down. In fairness, Tipperary put it right up to us in the first half.

“I thought their puck-outs were outstanding. Barry Hogan was getting great puck-outs off, there was great movement, caused us a lot of problems. We got in at half-time, was able to solve that a small bit.

“In fairness to Donal O’Rourke, he tweaked a couple of things and that seemed to work in the second half. We worked a couple of scores to make life easier for us.

“In fairness there’s been a lot of coaching done on that in the last couple of years. I was involved in it myself and Donal has done a lot of work. We see that in training an awful lot. We left an awful lot of goals behind us against Limerick. We left an awful lot of goals behind us in the first half against Clare and it cost us the game in the end. We took all our chances today.”

And another hat-trick for Alan Connolly.

“Alan was very, very good,” he added. “Over the last number of games, Alan has been working really hard. He left a couple of goals behind him in different games but he took every chance today, thank God.

“I thought Brian Hayes was outstanding inside as well. Shane (Barrett) gave us great purchase. I thought Ethan Twomey was brilliant before he went off, really got on a load of ball. Luke Meade was disappointed that he wasn’t getting on all along and was excellent when he came on. Really got on ball, shored up the thing, showed what he can offer as well.”

When asked what pleased him most, he responded: “I think the way we stuck at it again. We were at it even when Tipperary had a run, we were tapping over scores, we were in the game. We showed savage intent. We stayed connected with what we wanted to do. Fellas were vocal, you could hear them and we were really, really connected.

“Last year a couple of times in games we kind of went out of it and stopped talking and when teams got a run on us they got too big a run on us. But I think in the last two games that’s the way we wanted to play because look you’re playing really, really good teams and they’re going to get scores. You just can’t panic.

“Look, fellas will give out about the amount of scores we’ve conceded – look at the scores, there’s scores being conceded all over the place. From our point of view, you just have to be able to score 30 points plus now to win games.

“We know we have potential. We’ve had potential for the last four or five years but just haven’t been able to bring it through. It’s about getting that consistency. Everyone can see that on a given day Cork can put in any performance. The really good teams, the Limericks the Kilkennys of the past the Dublins, all those teams they performed.”