BY JOHNNY CAROLAN
HOW do you quieten the hype in Cork with an All-Ireland final to look forward to and the potential ending of a 19-year wait?
You don’t is the simple response from Cork manager Pat Ryan. While the fans can let themselves get carried away, inside the dressing room door there is an acute knowledge that nothing is won yet, even with Limerick’s scalp taken twice.
‘It will be impossible to quell it down in Cork,’ Ryan said, ‘we'd get confident after winning a tiddlywinks match!
‘From our fellas, it'll be just minding it from ourselves. It is hard, look, fellas are amateur men. They are going into schools, they are going into work, they are going into their families.
‘But from our point of view, we know the job is not finished. That will be our attitude.’
Certainly, there is a confidence within the camp – Ryan took parental leave from his job in Pfizer so as to have a clear run at the final, so sure was he that Cork would topple Limerick.
While Cork were so impressive in beating the Shannonsiders at SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh in May, that was given less importance in the lead-in to Sunday than the workmanlike victories against Offaly and Dublin. Limerick in Croke Park were seen as a different animal but then, this was the only time apart from 2021 that they were facing Munster opposition at this stage of the competition rather than the usual last-four joust against a Galway’s side whose measure they always had.
That Cork could win with just one goal – rather than needing three or even four, as was widely predicted – is a further sign of the growing maturity within the side. Brian Hayes had a coming-of-age performance but equally important was the superb display from Patrick Collins in goal and the collective defensive effort that limited Limerick to a slightly-less-than-average 29 points.
And yet, the champions could have prevailed. Had Shane O’Brien pointed to bring them back to within a point with two minutes of normal time left, it’s quite possible if not probably that they would have found a surge to cap what would be hailed as one of their greatest-ever feats.
On the day, the breaks went with Cork and not Limerick – after going unbeaten at Croker since 2019, they were probably due such a day. It doesn’t mean that they will be ambling off the stage any time soon, though – the last side stopped when going for five-in-a-row, Kilkenny in 2010, came back to win the next two and it’s not hard to imagine a Limerick riposte.
That’s for another day and another year, though. For Cork, it’s all about the 21st and a chance to end an unwanted record. Here’s hoping the hype train makes it safely into the station.
