De Búrca leads way as Déise put an end to nightmare streak
WATERFORD manager Liam Cahill paid tribute to Tadhg de Búrca for the manner in which he came back from a serious knee injury to steer them to a deserved Munster semi-final victory at Semple Stadium.
In the process Cahill, in his first Championship game in charge, ended a nightmare period for Waterford as they secured their first win in the province since defeating Clare in 2016.
And it also marked Waterford’s first Championship victory since they defeated Cork in the 2017 All-Ireland semi-final.
Tipperary native Cahill could hardly have hoped for a better start to his first Championship campaign with Clashmore/ Kinsalebeg clubman De Búrca which set the tone and delivered a huge win.
‘Even before I came to Waterford he was a guy I was looking at every summer as one of the key back men in the country. To come back from the injury he had 12 months ago to that kind of form is credit to the man himself,’ said Cahill.
‘These fellas have been questioned in the past, but we’re just looking forward now,’ he added
Cork manager Kieran Kingston, starting his second spell with the Rebels, had no complaints about the outcome, although his injury problems were compounded beforehand when full-back Colm Spillane and wing-forward Aidan Walsh were ruled out.
‘I said beforehand I didn’t really know where we stood but today we didn’t bring the performance from training,’ said Kingston. ‘Over the course of the 70-odd minutes I think we didn’t deserve to win the game.
‘When you look back on it we lost more than our fair share of those 50-50 balls and that’s disappointing. From our perspective, we have a game under our belt, we have to regroup, see what the draw brings and see what we can learn from today.’
Waterford led by 0-15 to 0-12 at the end of an opening that lacked championship intensity. Waterford shot 14 wides in that opening half but tidied up their shooting after the restart and didn’t hit a wide in the secondhalf.
Cork hit nine wides in the opening half and added half a dozen more when they had the wind after the break, but the Leesiders were always chasing the game.
Dessie Hutchinson crowned his Championship debut with a couple of excellent points from the right in the opening half and added another one in the secondhalf.
They recovered from a slow start and Stephen Bennett didn’t let a couple of missed frees bother him – ending with a dozen points from placed balls.
Patrick Horgan led the Cork challenge and got the gap back to a goal at the break but the key score of the game came after the sides had twice exchanged points when Lyons soloed down the right before striking the ball to the net with a drop shot.
Jack Prendergast and Bennett quickly followed with frees to lead by 1-19 to 0-14 after 40 minutes and while Cork rallied with three points on the trot – two from Séamus Harnedy and one from Christopher Joyce – to reduce the margin to five after 44 minutes, Waterford kept that gap between them until the closing stages.
Hutchinson crowned a superb debut when he extended the lead to six with his third point before another Bennett free from distance left Cahill’s men leading by 1-27 to 0-23 with three minutes of regular time remaining.
There was a glimmer of hope for Cork when Horgan blasted a free to the net in the closing stages to leave just three between them but sub Patrick Curran sealed an excellent win with the insurance point