Cork’s new attacking edge faces acid test against Derry

When Cork arrive at Celtic Park on Sunday, the locals won't recognise the team which gets off the bus. Of the 20 players Cork used in defeat to Derry four years ago, half are no longer part of the set-up.

Cork's line-up against Meath featured five out and out forwards, including Chris Óg Jones. Pic: ©INPHO/James Lawlor

Seán Meehan’s scramble defence was unmatched at Páirc Uí Rinn last Sunday. Of Cork’s 10 defensive turnovers in the second half, Meehan was responsible for four. His party trick was to appear out of nowhere and launch himself onto whatever winding Meath boot was threatening mayhem.

For all his scrambling and firefighting, Meehan was a flow of level-headed reasoning when chatting this newspaper out on the field shortly after full-time.

“My immediate reaction is that it is two points. It was two points up for grabs last week, it was two points up for grabs this week, and it'll be the same again next week,” the Cork defender began.

Correct though he was, we pointed out to him that Cork have absolutely no recent form in collecting all available points. Their changed form has fed a changed conversation. It’s a conversation fixated on promotion.

Is it, we asked, a conversation to be embraced by a typically under-fire Cork panel, or does it have the potential to distract from the weekly job of tucking two points in the gearbag?

Meehan’s reply was as sharp as his reaction to James Conlon’s goal drive midway through the second half.

“Last time this group went to Derry, we came home with our tail between our legs, so it is fairly easy to keep our focus on what is directly in front of us,” he said.

That trip to Derry, in February of 2022, has the feel of being from a different lifetime. We thank Meehan for having reminded us of it.

Given their current table-topping status and the destination being typed into Google Maps this weekend, there are few more appropriate fixtures from which to chart a Cork evolution that is finally moving beyond punch runners and sideline attacking obsession.

Cork were completely overrun at Owenbeg four years ago. It finished 1-13 to 0-7 in favour of the hosts. Of Cork's 29 League outings since, only two have gone worse.

Of the 20 players used at Owenbeg, eight featured last Sunday. Of the 20 used, exactly half are no longer part of the Cork set-up.

That 2022 spring saw new manager Keith Ricken and coach John Cleary cast the net to the point of ripping. 36 players saw game-time. Listowel native Joe Grimes, Newmarket’s Paudie Allen, former Cork hurler Billy Hennessy, and Mark Buckley of Dohenys are a selection of those to fleetingly appear on stage.

As is not unusual for a new management, the Cork sideline had little idea of their strongest line-up. Poor health befalling Ricken saw Cleary take the reins ahead of Round 6. He’s been in situ ever since. He knows what he has and what is available outside. Save for young Dara Sheedy, auditions are no longer being held.

Seven players - Daniel O’Mahony, Luke Fahy, Colm O’Callaghan, Seán McDonnell, Paul Walsh, Mark Cronin, and Chris Óg Jones - have started all four games in 2026. Four more - Patrick Doyle, Tommy Walsh, Maurice Shanley, and Matty Taylor have started in three. Those numbers would be higher again but for the late return of Barrs pair Ian Maguire and Steven Sherlock.

Cleary’s selections speak loudest to the change in Cork thinking. Caution has been belatedly dispensed with. The line-up against Meath contained five out and out forwards. The exception was Paul Walsh. We hope he won’t take offence to being labelled a ball-carrier and middle-third link player.

Such accommodation for creativity marks a significant departure for a management whose preferred ratio of finishers to runners used to be 5:1 in the other direction.

Following their 2023 All-Ireland group win over Louth, Irish Examiner columnist Patrick Kelly pleaded for spontaneity to break through and a second finisher to be selected alongside Brian Hurley.

“I just wish we could play another finisher as opposed to having the four or five lads around the middle who will work all day and keep it sensible.” 

Earlier the same year, Kelly had characterised Cork’s approach as “lateral” and “one-dimensional” .“It is very much a running game. Very little looking up to kick and to move the ball through the lines quickly,” wrote the 2010 All-Ireland winner.

In the 2023 All-Ireland quarter-final against this weekend’s opponents, 19 minutes came and went before Cork attempted to unlock the Derry defence by means of a forward kickpass. Players were programmed to put the head down and charge, rather than tilt the chin upwards and laser in a kick pass.

The frustrating irony was that when they did travel this latter, direct route, they found back-to-back points at the end of the first-half to close the interval gap to the minimum. Rory Maguire’s second-half major also arrived by similar transport.

An obvious rebuttal to this observation is that football’s then congested environment didn’t encourage or allow for such kickpassing. But even when the landscape was redrawn, Cork largely refused adventure and attacking aggression.

In last year’s All-Ireland preliminary quarter-final defeat to Dublin, Cork’s opening point arrived courtesy of quick kickpassing from Matty Taylor and Colm O’Callaghan to feed Chris Óg Jones. No similar example materialised until the 32nd minute when Jones was fed by an over-the-top delivery for a goal effort Stephen Cluxton saved.

Last Sunday, four first-half points materialised from the first instinct of Cork players being to lift their head and look inside. Execution matched their exciting new mentality.

Even the kickout press of two lines of four is transformed from Cleary’s first season when Cork didn’t win a single Dublin restart in their All-Ireland quarter-final clash, and only pressed up on the Dublin restart after scorable frees and 45s.

In make-up and mindset, the locals won’t recognise the Cork side that gets off the bus on Sunday.

Cork (v Derry, 2022 League): Chris Kelly; Kevin O’Donovan, Seán Meehan, Tadhg Corkery; Rory Maguire, Billy Hennessy, Matty Taylor; Ian Maguire, Shane Merritt; Dan Dineen, Fionn Herlihy, Colm O’Callaghan; Steven Sherlock, David Buckley, Brian Hurley.

Subs (used): John O’Rourke, Kevin Flahive, Daniel O’Connell, Blake Murphy, Cian Kiely.