Éamonn Fitzmaurice: Cork left asking 'what now?' once again

A sickener of a defeat against Louth means the Rebels will have to reflect on any progress made this year.

Mon, 24 Jun, 2024 - 14:05

The eternal 'what now' question is relevant on Leeside again this morning, following their defeat and exit from this year’s championship in Inniskeen. This one will really hurt. Deservedly there has been plenty of positive noises about Cork signalling that they have been going in the right direction since they righted the ship mid-may through the league. They have looked more like themselves and the swagger of old was returning. The Donegal win felt significant.

Losing to Kerry and Tyrone would have been within the acceptable margin of error. Losing to Louth in a game they should have won isn’t. John Cleary has deepened his squad, mixing the old and the new. The injury profile of some of their players doesn’t help them. Brian Hurley looked as if he was minding his hamstrings and tried to affect the game with his nous, determination and experience.

Seán Powter wasn’t introduced until the 57th minute. They were possibly trying to avoid using him to protect him for a potential quarter-final next weekend. Even in the short time he was on the field he made a huge difference. His positioning allowed Chris Óg Jones to play closer to goal where he also thundered into the game.

They will have nightmares about the closing, game-defining sequence. They were in possession with the clock ticking down and the sides level. All day long they had displayed remarkable levels of patience. They refused to play the game on Louth’s terms. While it was like watching paint dry it was telling. They played outside of the deep lying Louth defence.

They avoided taking the ball into contact, protecting against the danger of Louth’s strong counter attacking game. It was conservative, but effective. Maybe today they will feel it was too conservative. They made sure they weren’t playing to Louth’s strengths but by doing so did they blunt some of their own edge?

The only time they forced the issue was the most important time not to. Chris Kelly gave Rory Maguire an awkward hand pass and the Castlehaven man was turned over. Louth countered at pace and a soft free was awarded against Matty Taylor, that allowed Sam Mulroy to kick the match winning score.

Even at that they had one more attack. Again they forced the issue and ended up boxed in, in the 13 corner when the full time whistle sounded. All through the game it felt to me like a game that if they won it could be a defining step for their group. Instead it is the opposite.

Of course Louth deserve massive credit for navigating a passage to the All-Ireland quarter final. Ger Brennan has improved them by every known metric this year. Within the county while there was disappointment with the manner of Mickey Harte and Gavin Devlin’s exit there was an equal feeling that there was much more to Louth football than just two Tyrone men. The playing group, led by Brennan and his management team, have proven that throughout 2024. Reaching the quarter-final is an achievement and is probably their ceiling, for this season.

The Derry resurrection

I can still recall watching Derry in the Division 4 league final in 2019. Something about them that day drew me in and I have followed their progress closely over the last few years, and really enjoyed doing so. I always liked Derry and their football culture. I was 16 and impressionable when they won the All-Ireland and I loved watching the likes of Henry Downey, Tony Scullion, Johnny McGurk, Anthony Tohill and Dermot McNicholl.

I came across St Pat's Maghera in colleges finals. I always found them a knowledgable and passionate football people. Like everyone else I struggled to comprehend what had happened to them in the last few months. The level of drop off in their performance levels was unprecedented. Taking emotion or hearsay out of it, there were a couple of questions that I had, and raised them at the time.

I thought it was foolish to bring back the Glen players a week after winning the All-Ireland club for the Kerry league game in Tralee. I also thought it was strange that the players were staying on in Portugal after the management went home from their training camp in Quinta da Lago. It is definitely not something I would have done two weeks out from Ulster championship against Donegal.

If they wanted the players to have some downtime surely it made sense to have the R&R part of the trip first, followed by the training camp element, the raison d’etre of the trip? I was surprised they didn’t tweak their game plan when they encountered issues in the matches that they lost. Long kickouts against Donegal, indiscipline and turnovers against Galway, kickouts and turnovers against Armagh. For me that was always the most enjoyable part of management. Reacting and adjusting, trying to make the team better and robust to meet all challengers.

They may have felt they were the finished article after the league final. No team is ever the finished article. There are always little improvements to be made. They could continue to largely play as they had been, but with some small adjustments. That is part of developing a team. Evolution. Continuous improvement. While they did adjust for Westmeath they looked so bereft of confidence it felt as if they were only postponing the inevitable. But then they drew Mayo. That was the angle they needed.

As I mentioned last week they have reminded me at times of Kerry in 2009 as we walked a tightrope through the qualifiers. Their fuse has been lit once more. All of their big players played well on Saturday in Castlebar and looked themselves. Conor Glass, Brendan Rogers, Gareth McKinless, Ethan Doherty and Shane McGuigan and Ciarán McFaul as the game went on. Lachlan Murray was outstanding. From the off they were different. They looked angry and their body language was of a team that were up for the fight. They were back working hard.

Before big games I often used the expression “Earn the right to play, then play.” Derry typified that on Saturday evening. They worked, tackled, tracked and blocked down. Their kickout press was much better, the spacing of their forwards when they attacked was back to its best. For the second match in a row they didn’t concede a goal from play. They were still feeling their way, as illustrated by some of the errors they made in possession, but they kept at it.

When Mayo were awarded that fortuitous penalty and Ryan O’Donoghue nailed it I thought to myself now we will really see where Derry are at. When a team is struggling with their confidence the true test comes when they receive a setback mid-game. McKinless understood this and was immediately onto his team mates to keep calm and stick to the plan. Their leaders were prominent in that critical phase of the game. McKaigue rescued them at the end of normal time. Glass was colossal and everywhere.

When Kevin McStay and Mayo reflect on the season it will be very much of the ‘what if’ variety. They lost the Connacht final with the last kick of the match. Dublin drew with them with the last play of that game to send them to the preliminaries. Derry saved themselves at the death and finished them with penalties. They will believe they could and should have won all three games. Instead they end up out and with nothing. They need to find the why.

Meanwhile Derry drive on. While fatigue will be a factor next weekend in the quarter-finals, they are coming again with a winning habit. None of the three teams that they can face will want them. They can also take strength from the fact that, remarkably, going all the way back to 2012, the team that has eliminated Mayo has won the All-Ireland every year, bar 2018.

Measured Roscommon

Roscommon were outstanding in Omagh on Saturday evening. Their form line has been going in the right direction since the end of the league. They competed well with Mayo, Dublin and Mayo again for large periods of those games but eventually lost all of them. Against Tyrone they played an impressive brand of measured attacking football, which suits their personnel. They looked to move the ball forward as much as possible, by foot or by hand and by minimising plays. They put very little up for grabs but they did it in an an ambitious as opposed to a conservative way. Many of the turnovers that Tyrone achieved were individual skill errors rather than poor decisions. They mixed their approach by pressing Niall Morgan on frees and withdrawing in normal play. They were fantastic on breaks.

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In attacking quartet of Daire Cregg, Diarmuid Murtagh, Donie Smith and Conor Cox, they have finishers that most other teams would love. To emphasise this, their shooting accuracy from play was an excellent 76%. Conor Carroll was nerveless and accurate on his own restarts when Tyrone pressed them hard in the closing stages and in coming out as a plus one attacker. Rather than sitting deep and acting as a pivot to retain possession he advanced as a kicking playmaker to set up scores. This was best illustrated by his pass to Daire Cregg for their final score that effectively sealed the win. Their backs led by Brian Stack, Ruairí Fallon and Niall Higgins were tight and aggressive. This was their best championship performance under Davy Burke and sends them back to Croke Park with confidence where they avoid Dublin.

Knockout rules

Real championship is knockout. Whatever about a second chance, multiple chances simply doesn’t work. Last Monday on RTE, Jarlath Burns admitted as much. “The championship should have jeopardy, it should be more of a blunt instrument. The clue is in the title of the competition, the championship is there to get champions."

Thankfully we had all of that over the weekend, in particular in Castlebar on Saturday. There is such a different vibe around a knockout game, with so many little telltale signs. The jubilation in victory and the crushing disappointment in defeat, the body language of the players from the off, the tense faces of the managers when the camera pans to them, the there-is-no-tomorrow ferocity of the challenges, the victorious manager in his post match interview with a ‘we showed ye glint ’in his eyes, the vanquished bainisteoir speaking quietly and sincerely, with a chance that the referee will be caught in the crossfire.

The photographers lurking in the background to capture the managers expression in victory and more often in defeat. But most of it all it means excitement. That realisation that a teams seemingly interminable season is about to end pulls everyone in. It is a central strand of our GAA DNA. Do or Die. Anois nó riamh. One thing that has become more obvious over the last few weeks is championship shouldn’t be a league, for the players and public to ordeal and plod through. Certainly not a league that allows teams with relegation form to advance. Derry are in an All-Ireland quarter final after winning one match, losing three and drawing one, albeit winning the fixture on penalties. Championship that ain’t.

There were so many story lines this weekend and it is impossible to digest them all. Derry’s win, Mayo’s loss, Tyrone gone, Galway’s grit, Conor McManus’ possible imminent retirement and the Tailteann Cup and Minor semi-finals to name a few. That is without even thinking about hurling or the Euros. So much to discuss but so little time to do it. The draw for the quarter-finals takes place Monday morning and that moves the conversation forward straight away again. We need time to enjoy our games, pre and post match.