THE MIDDLE THIRD:The Ulster side's confidence has been the hallmark of their unexpected progress to the final, while Cork must cope with all the pressure and have work to do on the training ground, writes DARRAGH Ó SÉ
HATS OFF (again) to Down. I couldn’t see them beating Kildare. Shows how much I know! So much of what Down have achieved this year has been built on confidence. So much of the way they play the game is based on conviction. That self- belief is something which Cork will have to adapt to.
If Down had no self-doubt going into Sunday it was different for the rest of us. I couldn’t see it after the league final they lost to Armagh. I couldn’t see it after the Donegal game. Against Tyrone for 20 minutes they were effective and good but I still couldn’t see it. Against Kerry they played a tired team who had only only two or three fellas playing to standard. Now, though, we have to sit up and take note.
Back in 1997 with Kerry we were a little closer to Cork’s position now than we were to Down’s. The county was in its 11th year without an All-Ireland and there was huge pressure. I was lucky in that I was young and there was a nervous energy going through me which got me through the occasion. The hunger and desperation to win that one was huge, though. As I say, I was lucky. I know that if you are younger and in a big game something going wrong early on in the game can throw you off. Cork may run into trouble this month from the pressure they have put on themselves all season. They need to win this All-Ireland so badly.
The pressure reminds me a little of the Kerry five-in-a-row team. Talk to those guys and they were so experienced they should have been bulletproof, yet the 1982 final became a game they couldn’t really win. Everything was set up against them in the end, including their own desperation. The feeling they should win, that they had to win and it would be a disaster if they didn’t left them vulnerable.
Cork will create the same pressures in their heads. The odds on them winning depend on how they deal with that.
They are playing Down as opposed to a Kerry or Tyrone or a team they are familiar with. Part of Down’s magic this year is that apart from some of the forwards like Marty Clarke, Benny Coulter and Danny Hughes plus the absent midfielder Ambrose Rogers, very few of them are national names. Not many people outside their own county would be able to name the Down team. That is tricky to play against.
Cork are facing a hungry team who don’t care if Cork never won an All-Ireland. Cork’s hard luck stories don’t even interest Down. They aren’t programmed like that. Down are quite comfortable looking after themselves. They know already they will go at this final in a certain style. They won’t go away without throwing everything at it. They will want to finish this out. This is a real chance for them to make it big, a year or two ahead of schedule.
Confidence. Joe Brolly described the Down mentality well on television – even when they get beaten they carry themselves off the field as if they had just won the game. You need that confidence in yourself to build a season like they have had. You see it in their free-takers and in passages of their play and passing. Look at Marty Clarke, the way he throws the ball around the field, the way he knows it will come back to him. Confidence.
Players generally become better as they win. A fella who wins an All-Ireland develops as a player quite quickly. Success frees him up. A great example for me was Tommy Dowd of Meath who kept getting better the older he got. Declan O’Sullivan is another. You could see the rapid improvement in Declan after his first All-Ireland.
Down are exceptional in that they seem to get better when they get near to an All- Ireland final. If Down get over the line this year and beat Cork they will be around for a couple of years. If Cork win then Cork will be around for even longer. Whoever loses could be set back for some time, however.
Down already have that great self-belief. Look at the interviews they do before and after games. No worries. They believe in positives.
They believe in just surfing the wave. Had Down lost to Kildare the last day we would say straight away that James McCartan had brought them on a ton.
Now they are in a final and they will handle the media hype and enjoy it without losing the run of themselves. You could see signs of that on Sunday before and after the game as Down players and management spoke to cameras and media a lot but in a positive, thoughtful way. The football satellites of Down are places where the passion ignites quickly. They are right to milk it and enjoy it. It suits them. It is a bonus to be in an All-Ireland and they will wring every last drop from it.
They go back to training this week, to get kitted out for their suits and to all sorts of pleasant distractions going on. The enjoyment for them is this is what Down do best. This is where they come into their own. This week in Down the kids will be enjoying the last couple of days of summer with an All-Ireland to look forward to. It’s a great way to be.
When Cork get back to training I think they will have to rediscover how to move the ball a bit faster. Cork see this as their chance. They have been in finals and lost them. and they have had years when they have played better football then they have done this season.
What is crucial now is to see if they can accelerate their game again. In the semi -finals they had the slowest build-up play of any of the four teams. Down’s backs aren’t as good as they should be, I still reckon, but they are being baled out by the work-rate of their half-forward line, who cover off a lot of play. A slow build-up in Cork’s play will crucify them. It suits Down to play on the break.
I believe Cork’s name is on the cup but that makes no difference before throw-in. The form book goes out the window now. Down’s strength is in their forwards and midfield. Cork have been struggling a bit there. I thought one of the unsung heroes in the Kerry game last month was Kalum King. He put in another big day’s work again on Sunday and beside him Peter Fitzpatrick caught some great ball. That cost Kildare. They weren’t competitive enough. Down won’t be overrun there by Cork.
And, what do you do with, say, a fella like Marty Clarke? I think you need a man-to-man marker. I like his decision making. He knows when to hold and when to fold. He is spot on in terms of distribution. He is more crucial at this stage, I would say, than Benny Coulter and he has taken a lot of pressure off Benny.
Having two marquee forwards is a luxury these days. Usually there is only one designated tight-marking back on one side. Cork will need to find two of them before they even start worrying about Down’s hard- working wing forwards.
That was another feature of Sunday. In James McCartan and Kieran McGeeney we had two young managers who have done exceptionally well with the talent available. They made up for the lack of experience and big names in other departments. Tactics, attitude, work.
Over the 70 minutes Down were the better team but Kildare’s season has been a tribute to McGeeney’s intelligence. It’s unfortunate we have to mention controversies again but had Kildare not conceded that goal at the time they did who knows what would have happened?
Still they took it on the chin and fought on and, from the neutral point of view, they gave us a cracking game of football.
I thought McGeeney came across afterwards as very dignified. He made a good point too. If Aidan O’Rourke is being cited for pitch incursions, if we are pouncing on the silly stuff without dealing with bigger issues we are marring our own games.
The games are all we have in the summertime yet we spend so much time on the silly things, fencing off Croke Park etc, and missing important things, like crucial scores. It’s not good enough at this level. It’s a bad state of affairs.
We spoke last week about Kildare’s ability to rotate possession of the ball until they found the right player. They couldn’t do that on Sunday. They hadn’t the calm or the time to pick the right fellas out.
Look at Coulter’s point, though, when he played a pass, got it back and fired over a brilliant score, a perfect example of working the possession until the crack appears in the opposition defence. Yet another sign of big-time confidence. Down are a new and fresh team and there is a lot of goodwill towards them this summer. McCartan will realise that and give them some freedom.
Everybody loves a good news story and Down will be letting everybody imagine another happy northern ending this month.
Cork have work to do on the training ground and things to handle in their heads.
