'Disappointed' Cleary laments Cork inaccuracies and Jones' black card

Cork came to Tullamore chasing a first three-in-a-row of championship victories in 12 years.

Sat, 15 Jun, 2024 - 18:29

Eoghan Cormican

The vexation for Cork is that they weren’t outclassed or outthought or outmuscled. They were instead their own undoing.

Cork came to Tullamore chasing a first three-in-a-row of championship victories in 12 years. They were chasing top spot in Group 3, a bypassing of the preliminary quarter-final round, and a last-eight pairing that would have steered clear of the biggest hitters.

That their chase was unsuccessful and that they must now get on the road for an away preliminary quarter-final next weekend owed to a wastefulness and absence of efficiency with their final product.

In the first half, there were four white flag attempts sent wide, and two more that dropped short and came off the post respectively.

Two minutes into the second period, there was a Paul Walsh goal effort flashed to the right of the post. There was a tame Colm O'Callaghan goal effort much later in the half comfortably saved.

Brian O’Driscoll, goalkeeper Chris Kelly, and Mark Cronin all blazed wide. O’Driscoll and Conor Corbett succeeded in getting in each other’s way when pouncing on possession inside the Tyrone 20-metre line.

Cork were at 47% accuracy from open play, Tyrone at 75%, were on a different field altogether.

“We are very disappointed,” began John Cleary.

“We played very well in the first half, but we didn’t take our scores. We should have been four or five up at half time and we weren’t (Cork led 0-10 to 0-9 at the break). It ultimately came down to that.

“The black card (Chris Óg Jones was sin-binned on 43 minutes) cost us big time in the second half. We went from a stage where we were going in five on three when we looked up, but instead of getting a score, we ended up a man down.

“In fairness to Tyrone, they punished us big time when we had a man off. They managed the game better during that period than we did. That was a lesson for us, and it cost us the game.”

There was an equally sharp lesson in the price to be paid when you fail to translate control and turnovers into coloured flags against an outfit higher up the football food chain than you.

“I suppose that is the beauty of playing in Division 1 year in, year out and playing against the top teams. You get your times of dominance, as we had today, and when we get those we have got to be clinical. And then when you are under the cosh, you have got to manage things better.

“I think we maybe slightly panicked a small bit and tried to kick away points. Ultimately Tyrone deserved to win in the end and we just have got to take lessons from it as a group.”

There is little time for lessons. It is now about championship survival. Cork are on the road for their preliminary quarter-final. It could be west to Castlebar or Salthill. It could be north to Armagh. It could even be Croke Park. No gimmes there.

“At the start of the league, we were three games down and our next game was away in Fermanagh, and it was do or die. The guys galvanised and got going and that’s what we intend to do for this week. I said to the lads inside there we can be feeling sorry for ourselves now for ten minutes but championship week starts right now.

“This is the first time in the championship this year where it could be our last game or we could be going to Croke Park. There’s still a big prize at stake and hopefully, we can learn from the learnings here now today. We just have to wait until Monday morning. It’s the luck of the draw then where we could be going.”

Brian Hurley didn’t feature here because of a hamstring problem that left him less than “100%”. When asked about the likelihood of Hurley being right for said preliminary quarter-final, Cleary replied that he didn’t know. It's 50/50, he reckoned.

Tyrone will enjoy home comforts for their preliminary quarter-final. Joint-manager Brian Dooher said their challenge was “touch and go” for so much of the opening half. The remedying second-half tonic was less carelessness in possession and more force without.

“In the first half we felt we were turned over too easy. Cork got three or four points from us giving away the ball too easily. We just hadn't the intensity in the tackle. Sure we were getting back, but we weren't doing anything when we did get back.

“Whereas in the second half we were getting hands on. In the first half, we didn't get hands on tackles. Cork, by and large, played the way they wanted to play. Once you allow them to do that, Cork are a very good side, as we saw against Donegal.

“Obviously a home tie is extremely important. Everybody wants to play on their home pitch and to have everything that comes with that. But it was just about getting a performance, getting a win, and moving on to the next step. Whoever that is next week, we'll have to just deal with it. There's nothing easy from here on.”