Victory over Cork a badly needed tonic for Tipperary
KEY MAN: Tipperary teenager Darragh McCarthy scored 10 points, five from play, in his side's Allianz Hurling League victory over Cork. Pic: INPHO/Ken Sutton
April and May remain judge and jury. Nothing has changed there. What Tipperary are attempting to do is win back the court of public opinion before taking the championship stand.
However sizeable the disconnect between the county’s flagship team and their strained following, results such as Saturday evening are a prescription tonic for narrowing the divide.
Liam Cahill’s positive preachings in the Nenagh Guardian last week were matched under Thurles lights by a positive performance and another two points pocketed. That partnership, mind, is already well-proven in spring. An ability to endure to April and beyond is what remains unproven.
They’ve learned the hard way in Tipp that one cannot exist without the other come championship. Words, irrespective of the chord they strike or pride they stoke, will only ever go so far as to grab the audience’s attention. It is results that hold and keep the audience.
On Saturday, Cahill and his charges continued down the road to redeeming their identity. On Saturday, they gave further evidence of the exciting space they’ve manoeuvred themselves into.
“It’s very positive from my point of view. The players are working really hard, a lot of people supporting them behind the scenes. We just have a really good feeling about what we’re doing,” the Tipp boss began.
“We’re all, from myself right through the squad, really enjoying our hurling at the moment. It’s brilliant to be in that kind of a space.
“It is a space of everyone working together to have that environment that people want to come to and enjoy their training and enjoy the challenges that are coming around the opposition of what they'll present. The challenge of redeeming our identity as a group of players, and ourselves as a management team that we are fully committed to this thing. We really want to portray that out onto the field every day we play.
“We are looking really to the future now. The future is in our hands. It is in my hands with this group of young players, albeit with a number of more senior players there as well to support them.
“We are not looking back anymore. We are fully committed to looking forward, learning every day we go out and improving every day we go out.”
If they were minded to take a backward glance, they’d have noted that Cork’s last two visits to Thurles saw them rack up totals of 4-30 and 3-30 respectively. Saw them rack up winning margins of 18 and 12 points.
Cork managed just the solitary green flag on this latest visit. Made by Shane Barrett on eight minutes, tapped in by Brian Hayes. That their green flag count wasn’t in line with recent visits was a combination of poor execution and Barry Hogan's excellence.
Tipp were more clinical. Two clear-cut chances presented themselves. Both were taken. Both painted the Cork defence in a less than flattering light.
Their opener, four minutes in, stemmed from a superb Alan Tynan fetch. He offloaded to Jake Morris just outside the 45-metre line, whose run to goal from there was nigh-on uninterrupted. Similarly on 59 minutes when Hogan’s delivery broke kindly to Craig Morgan outside the 45-metre line, his was also an uninterrupted run to goal. He offloaded to half-time substitute Dylan Walsh for the finish.
Walsh’s goal was part of an important final quarter push and response. After a four-in-a-row from Darragh Fitzgibbon, Patrick Horgan, Diarmuid Healy brought Cork level at 1-17 apiece on 54 minutes, chants of ‘Rebels, Rebels, Rebels’ rang out from the Ryan Stand.
Tipperary had faded out of the Limerick defeat two weeks earlier. Hadn’t scored from play beyond the 44th minute. Winning back public favour meant they could afford no repeat here.
Ronan Maher and the extremely diligent pair of Morris and Morgan produced a three-in-a-row before Walsh went and doubled their advantage. 2-20 to 1-17.
If sealing their third League win was a collective effort, the foundations were laid single-handedly by teenager Darragh McCarthy. Cork’s starting six forwards contributed five scores from play - 1-4 - over the 70 minutes. McCarthy had taken Ger Millerick for five scores from play - 0-5 - by half-time. He also won one of the three first-half frees he converted. His last of a first-half 0-8 haul came from underneath the Ryan Stand. The home support in the crowd of 11,357 rose and roared.
“When the dates came out in the League, I would personally be always aiming towards Cork coming to Thurles again, that you would start making sure that you are putting those building blocks in place that needed to happen, and bringing a bit of enthusiasm back into what has to be Tipperary hurling,” Cahill continued.
“The energy tonight on the field feeding up into the stands and the stands down into the players, it was a lovely place to be, and please God we'll look forward to more days like that as we move forward with this exciting team.”
D McCarthy (0-10, 0-5 frees); G O’Connor, J Forde (0-3 each); J Morris (1-1); D Walsh (1-0); C Morgan, R Maher (free), W Connors, A Tynan, O O’Donoghue (0-1 each).
D Fitzgibbon (0-11, 0-6 frees, 0-1 65’); P Horgan (0-3, 0-1 free); B Hayes (1-0); R O’Flynn (0-2); M Mullins, C O’Brien, S Barrett, J O’Connor, D Healy (0-1 each).
Barry Hogan; E Connolly, M Breen, R Doyle; J Caesar, R Maher, B O’Mara; C Morgan, W Connors; G O’Connor, A Tynan, J Morris; S Kenneally, J Forde, D McCarthy.
D Walsh for Kenneally (HT); O O’Donoghue for Connors (55); M Corcoran for O’Mara (56); J McGrath for Forde (67); N McGrath for O’Connor (70).
P Collins; G Millerick, E Downey, N O’Leary; M Mullins, C Joyce, C O’Brien; T O’Mahony, D Fitzgibbon; E Twomey, S Barrett, R O’Flynn; J O’Connor, B Hayes, R Cotter.
P Horgan for Cotter (46); D Healy for O’Flynn (47); L Meade for O’Mahony (49); J Cahalane for O’Connor (55); B Roche for Twomey (64).
L Gordon (Galway).
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