As an exhibition of the skills of the Gaelic football code, the Cork versus Meath clash at Canton yesterday sufficed as a sampling of the thrills - well it lived up to the excitement quotient of recent seasons. The game was dead by halftime.

By then Cork had realised that they could score goals virtually any time they made an incursion into the Meath half.

Meath, without the physical and spiritual spine of their team, McDermott, Fay, Giles and Geraghty being in Australia, fielded a playfully experimental team which played some attractive football but neither the personnel not the occasion were conducive to the sternness for which Meath are renowned.

It was an unusually lightweight Meath performance which permitted Cork to play with the sort of fluency they hinted they were capable of all summer. Time and again they jigged through the Meath defence setting up goal chances. A little more accuracy and they might have had seven or eight.

Meath opened well with a flurry of confidently claimed points, but between times Cork were stealing goals. Meath were a point up when Micheal Cronin dropped a long ball in from the left wing that looped daftly into the Meath net. Donal Curtis and Evan Kelly responded for the All-Ireland champions before Micheal O'Donovan registered Cork's second goal.

Meath, baffled by this new ailment to their robust body, claimed the next two points before Cork surged ahead with three points and yet another goal, this one from Fionan Murray.

Meath had selected according to whimsy in some places it seemed. David Gallagher started at midfield but played the second half in goal. Cormac O'Sullivan began at full forward. The novelty of the occasion justified the tinkering. The result didn't. They went to the half-time break with Cork leading by 3-5 to 1-6 and the trend continued right at the start of the second half when Cork plundered their fourth goal, Don Davis this time doing the honours. So it went.

Phillip Clifford, in fine form, had another goal two-thirds of the way through the half to give the scoreboard a slightly surreal look.

In the end the principal lesson learned was about the absentees. Take men like Giles and McDermott away from Meath and they look ordinary. Little consolation there for those eyeing their crown next summer.

CORK: K O Connor; R McCarthy, S O hAilpin, A Lynch (1-0); M O Donovan, E Sexton, Martin Cronin (0-1); Michael O Sullivan (0-2), N Murphy, Micheal Cronin (1-0); Podsie O'Mahony (0-2), Don Davis (1-1), F Murray (1-1), P Clif- ford, (1-3), M O Sullivan.

MEATH: C Martin; M O'Reilly, E McManus, P Sharkey; P Reynolds, N Nestor, C Murphy; N Crawford, D Gallagher; E Kelly (0-1), J Devine (0-1), C McCarthy (0-2); R McGee (0-1), C O Sullivan, D Curtis (1-3). Subs: D Hunt for McManus D Keally for Gallagher, D Gallagher for C Martin.

Referee: B O'Gorman (Armagh).