Icing on the cake for first city of sporting excellence

NO, Roy Keane wasn’t there last night. But everyone else was. They came to Turners Cross to see a coronation, and that’s exactly what they got on the night the Shed was decommissioned.

The king may be gone, but Cork City wrote themselves into sporting history. To introduce a note of culture, vive les rois.

It’s been an extraordinary year on Leeside, with Cork reinforcing its credentials as the sporting capital of the country on the back of an array of silverware this year: Liam McCarthy was nestling with the ladies’ football and camogie trophies, and they had to make room for another arrival last night: the Eircom League trophy, with the FAI Cup final still to come. No wonder there’s a run on silver polish on Leeside.

It was appropriate that Cork annexed the league title last evening. After all, the name of the city was on the lips of every football fan in the western world thanks to Roy Keane’s P45. However, only an outsider might have thought last night’s game a fitting sideshow to the Roy Keane story. This was City’s night.

And Cork’s night. Two weeks ago the Evening Echo hosted a night of sporting legends in the city, an occasion that paid tribute to Cork icons such as Mick Barry, Donal Lenihan, Gerald McCarthy and Vincent O’Brien, among others. A key member of City’s backroom staff said last week that representatives of all sports and codes wished City all the best in their death-or-glory clash with Derry City last night. Demarcation and rivalry are never in the running when a Cork side are in the arena.

Questions? In rugby Ireland take the field against Australia today in Lansdowne Road with a Corkman at the helm and Leesiders in key positions throughout the team; there were more Corkmen on the field in the last Lions Test against New Zealand than any from any other county in Ireland.

In GAA Cork didn’t just annex the All-Ireland senior hurling title - seven of the eight Munster titles on offer came to the Rebel County, while the Hurler of the Year is expected to have a Cork accent this year, just last year.

In ladies’ GAA Cork, as ever, showed the way when it comes to dual achievement - the likes of Briege Corkery emulated Teddy McCarthy by collecting two All-Ireland titles in a matter of weeks, in both camogie and ladies football.

But last night and today both belong to City. They’ve flown the flag in Europe with distinction, giving the Eircom League credibility on the continent, while their positive domestic approach all season long got its ultimate reward last night, the first league title to come to Leeside since 1993. With ten minutes to go last night the game looked safe, and the citizens of the People’s Republic present took a deep breath: when they exhaled, the only soundtrack permissible for a Cork sporting triumph was on heavy rotation, “The Banks” echoing all the way down Summerhill South.

Maybe it was just business as usual. The business of the extraordinary.