Farrell acknowledges hurlers' epic win after 'fits and starts' Cork display

Irish Daily Mirror

5 hours ago

Dublin 1-19 Cork 1-16
After the first game at Croke Park on Saturday, anything felt possible.
Of course, a win for Cork, while huge, wouldn't have been anything nearly as seismic as what had gone before, given that Dublin have already lost two games in this Championship and Cork have shown an ability to raise their game against stronger opposition.
And they did so again but ultimately didn't threaten Dublin enough in the last 10 minutes or so when the game was up for grabs. Indeed, Dublin manager Dessie Farrell revealed afterwards that Con O'Callaghan was an option off the bench but, in the end, one they didn't feel they needed to use.
'It's not to say that we knew this wouldn't be a tight affair, but we were just going to hope that we had enough,' Farrell explained.
'There were conversations with the coaches with a couple of minutes to go. We just decided to hold on. If it was a little bit tighter, I think you would have seen him come on for sure, yeah.'
Suffice to say he'll be needed if Dublin are to challenge seriously for an All-Ireland in the coming weeks, or even extend their season beyond next weekend.
After going four points in front in as many minutes, they only scored four more times for the remainder of the half as the game was played on Cork's terms, with Chris Og Jones's 11th minute goal giving them a lead that they held all the way to the break, by which time it was two points.
They'll have felt it ought to have been more. Jones was denied a second goal by Stephen Cluxton in the 30th minute and though Cork converted the resulting 45 and pushed four points clear, Seán Bugler halved the deficit with a crucial two-pointer on the stroke of half-time to make it 1-8 to 0-9.
Dublin started the second half well, hitting Cork for 1-3 with just a point in reply in the first 10 minutes as Brian Howard took the goal brilliantly, but the visitors hit four unanswered to go ahead again and it was tit-for-tat until the last 10 minutes, when the scores dried up for Cork as they struggled for possession.
'Today we didn't miss an awful lot,' said Cork boss John Cleary. 'Other days I've been sitting here and we've missed goals and points and everything all over the place.
'I think we were very efficient, I think probably our problem was to try and get enough ball in hands, and we weren't able to do enough of that.
'I think Dublin won 90% of their own kick-outs maybe. I think we won maybe something over 50% of ours, and I think with the ball that we were getting, we were very efficient, and any time we did go up the field, we did bore holes in them at times, but unfortunately just fell short in the end.'
Farrell felt that his side had played in 'fits and starts', which was a reasonable observation.
He said: 'We struggled to get the consistency across the whole performance. It's never going to be plain sailing, an opposition is always going to get a purple patch, and it's how you can contain them in that period.
'We struggled to be clinical at times, and there were opportunities maybe to put a little bit of distance between ourselves and Cork at different stages. We didn't do that, we didn't take those opportunities, so it was always going to be a dogfight to the very end.'
Before becoming Dublin manager, Farrell had a role with the county hurlers' backroom team under Mattie Kenny and, of course, he is familiar with the current manager Niall Ó Ceallacháin, who is a Na Fianna clubmate.
It's a rare day that the Dublin footballers play second fiddle to their hurling counterparts.
'I spoke to Niall [when he got the job] but Niall doesn't need to be told anything,' said Farrell. 'He's doing a phenomenal job and did so with Na Fianna as well.
'It was a great appointment by the Dublin county board and there was a lot of good candidates in the mix. True to Niall's form, he hasn't let anybody down.
'He's done a brilliant job and he continues to do so. We wish him the best of luck from here on out.'
DUBLIN: Stephen CLUXTON 8; Eoin MURCHAN 7, Seán MacMAHON 6, Davy BYRNE 6; Brian HOWARD (1-0) 7, John SMALL (0-1) 8, Lee GANNON (0-1) 7; Peader Ó COFAIGH-BYRNE 8, Ciarán KILKENNY (0-1) 6; Killian McGINNIS 7, Seán BUGLER (0-5, 1tp) 8, Niall SCULLY (0-1) 6; Paddy SMALL (0-4) 8, Lorcan O'DELL 5, Cormac COSTELLO (0-5, 0-2f) 7.
Subs: Cian Murphy for O'Dell (45), Luke Breathnach (0-1) for McGinnis (57), Tom Lahiff for Gannon (59), Nathan Doran for Scully (68).
CORK: Micheál Aodh MARTIN (0-1 '45') 7; Neil LORDAN 6, Daniel O'MAHONY 6, Maurice SHANLEY 7; Brian O'DRISCOLL 7, Seán BRADY 7, Mattie TAYLOR 7; Ian MAGUIRE (0-1) 7, Colm O'CALLAGHAN (0-2) 7; Paul WALSH 5, Seán WALSH (0-1) 7, Seán McDONNELL 6; Mark CRONIN (0-4, 0-2f) 7, Bran HURLEY (0-2) 7, Chris Óg JONES (1-4) 8.
Subs: Eoghan McSweeney for Paul Walsh (48), Conor Cahalane for McDonnell (49-58, temp), Cathail O'Mahony (0-1) for Hurley (55), Seán Powter for Taylor (58), Luke Fahy for Lordan (63).
REFEREE: Seán Hurson (Tyrone).
QUOTE ME ON THAT
'We took the decision not to bring him on there. We sort of run the gauntlet on it a little bit for the last 10 minutes or so.'
Dublin manager Dessie Farrell on Con O'Callaghan.
STAR MAN - Chris Óg Jones (Cork)
May have finished on the losing side but Jones was the best forward on view with 1-4 from play and gave Seán MacMahon a difficult evening. Will rue his other first half goal chance, however.
AN OTHER - Peadar Ó Cofaigh-Byrne (Dublin)
Perhaps didn't scale the heights of Newry seven days earlier, but it was still a very efficient performance from Ó Cofaigh-Byrne in the engine room, which is becoming less of a problem area for Dublin.
UP NEXT
DUBLIN: All-Ireland quarter-final, June 28/29.
CORK: Season ends.