Early gift for Cork City

Cork City 2 Derry City 1

The points gained by Cork ensured they maintained their challenge for a place in Europe and the extra spice on a day that ended full of bonhomie and good humour was provided by the quality of the goals and the identity of their opponents.

Derry, it will be recalled, beat Cork in the semi-final of the Cup and they remain the only visiting team to have won at this venue. Cork were fully conscious of that, a fact betrayed by the comments of manager Liam Murphy afterwards.