It’s child’s play as Kerry annihilate Cork on home turf
Kerry show their class as Rebels fail to build on early goals
MUNSTER title number 80 for Kerry. The biggest Championship winning margin over Cork in 80 years. A first six-in-a-row since 1975-80, when Mick O’Dwyer shaped the fortunes of a team regarded as the greatest of all time. Cork’s longest barren spell without a Championship win over their noisy neighbours – it’s six years and counting – since a miserable nineyear stretch during that same Golden Years era.
If Kerry were looking for omens from the past to suggest there could be bright days ahead for this gilded generation, then it came here in the glorious sunshine. The ease with which they sliced and diced the home challenge sent out its own message as they cruised into the Super 8s in some style.
Given the round-robin format of the All-Ireland quarter-finals looks likely to act as a hot-house for this talented young team, there’s going to be a bit of talking up Kerry as serious All-Ireland contenders after this one. Connacht champions Galway, already in that same group, have been well warned.
It wasn’t so much about the big name inside trio of David Clifford, Paul Geaney and James O’Donoghue – though all three contributed handsomely to this victory – but the devastating nature of Kerry’s team play. Éamonn Fitzmaurice has rebuilt a team with pace that is built for the open expanses of Croke Park, even if Cork showed up some old defensive frailties early on, Ruairi Deane cleverly setting up both goals. Rather than being two dizzying punches, Kerry took them on the chin and simply battered Cork with body blow after body blow.
Nine points in a row removed the sting from a large home crowd and a Paul Geaney goal almost immediately on the restart removed any false hope of a comeback.
Hard to believe Cork enjoyed a dream start, playing as if they were determined to turn the remodelled Páirc Uí Chaoimh into a fortress.
Less than two minutes in, Luke Connolly recycled the ball on the right wing to Seán White who wore 11 on his back but was playing in a roving role.
He thumped it in to Deane who had height on Paul Murphy and fielded it brilliantly. Not only that, he had the smarts to cut inside and play a delicate ball across the square for Jamie O’Sullivan to punch to the net.
Now what the full-back was doing there is one for another day but it was the perfect start for Cork in front of a big home crowd.
What the Rebels needed to do then, was just settle and slow things down. Instead, Clifford stroked over a quick point in response and Kerry thundered through for a goal themselves. It was all too easy, David Moran winning the mark and feeding Stephen O’Brien who put on the afterburners to torch past Stephen Cronin and bury it past Mark White.
Clifford then showed his appetite for the physical cut and thrust, levelling Cronin with a shoulder to force a turnover before Seán O’Shea pointed.
Just when it was beginning to look a bit ominous for Cork, they nabbed a second goal, a close relation to the first.
Again, Deane picked up possession, this time scampering straight through and flicking the ball across the square, for Mark Collins to get the last touch.
Ahead 2-1 to 1-2, Cork couldn’t have asked for much more. And then Kerry did what Kerry do when they meet Cork, effortlessly going up through the gears.
From there to the interval, Kerry kicked nine points without reply, a pace and cohesion to their play that Cork simply couldn’t live with. Watching Cork players stand around by the half hour mark, hands on hips and stuck to the ground rather than making support runs, it looked like their heads were scrambled, every Kerry forward bar Micheál Burns filling his boots.
This was psychological as much as physical. When the hosts looked up next, the scoreboard read 1-11 to 0-2 as they jogged off down the tunnel for the turnaround.
Cork’s confidence was clearly shot by then, a mis-placed Kerry pass still managing to find its way to Paul Geaney who swivelled and found the net.
That Cork managed a single point between Luke Connolly’s 10th-minute score and a curled point by Peter Kelleher in the 55th minute tells the story of a meltdown.
Paul Geaney trickled in his second goal just for good measure.
Just like Kerry’s Golden Years, the balance of power doesn’t look like shifting any time soon.