IN THE confined calendar in which the inter-county season must now operate, injuries are almost an inevitability. Already during the current campaign, Cork have been without Shane Kingston, Declan Dalton, Ciarán Joyce, Ethan Twomey ,and Robert Downey at various points. However, with the biggest game of the season looming, Sunday’s All-Ireland semi-final against Limerick at Croke Park (4pm), the Rebels enjoy close to a clean bill of health.
Downey missed the quarter-final win over Dublin last Saturday week due to illness while Twomey was absent for that and the previous game against Offaly. Both are back though, to the relief of manager Pat Ryan
‘Yeah, everyone is good,’ he said. ‘Ethan Twomey is back now as well and will be in good contention. He’s trained the last couple of sessions so he’s back too.
‘We’re missing nobody really, except the two lads out medium- to long-term, Cathal McCarthy and Eoin Carey. Full credit to the medical team that we have and the strength & conditioning team that we have that the lads are in good shape. Obviously, lads are looking after themselves as well, which is great.’
While Cork had nine points to spare on Offaly and beat Dublin by five, the team’s performance was below the levels of the Munster SHC wins over Limerick and Tipperary. They do at least have the experience of being the only side to overcome the Shannonsiders in the current championship and Ryan expects a strong display from his side.
‘It’ll take a much better performance than what we’ve given all year to beat Limerick in an All-Ireland semi-final,’ he said.
‘We feel that the lads are in a good space. Obviously, you get certain things being made out of games where we fellas mightn’t play as well but we’re just focusing on winning.
‘As I said after one of those games, we’ve had a load of matches in the last 18 months where we’ve played excellent and they’ve been classics but we’ve lost them. Winning a couple of games that were dour affairs is good, too.
‘In fairness, we’ve trained great since the Dublin game, a few good sessions and fellas are in great form.
‘Obviously, the lads know that things are going up a level now and they’re bringing their preparation up a level, too.’
Beating Limerick in the Munster SHC does make a difference. ‘Yeah, it’s a positive,’ said Ryan. ‘Obviously, it’s a totally different game.
‘We performed excellently against them last year in the championship and obviously got over the line against them this year. In fairness, I think the difference between the games against them over the last two years in the championship is that we got a bit of luck in Páirc Uí Chaoimh and we didn’t get that bit of luck in the Gaelic Grounds.
‘A bounce of the ball here or there is probably what’s going to be the difference again on Sunday. ‘Lots of things are made about strategy and what you do here and what you do there,’ Ryan said.
‘The most important strategy, the times that we’ve played Limerick and the times that we’ve played well, has been our consistent performance around our attitude and our effort. We probably went out with similar plans against Offaly and Dublin but that focus, that commitment to really work to the plan and what you’re being asked to do, was probably missing'.
‘That’s what the best teams do, over and over again, is that they have the exact same attitude and their workrate is at a huge level. We’re going to need that. If you really analyse the games where we played well this year – against Clare for 50-odd minutes, or for the whole game really but just that we were a man down, against Limerick and Tipperary, our workrate has been sky-high. That’s where it needs to be and if we can bring that, we’ll be right there.’
