Sean Maguire’s golden touch puts Cork in sight of cup silverware

St Patrick’s Athletic 1 Cork City 3

As their rivals for the title contemplate a midweek trip to the Brandywell that they clearly could have done without, Cork City have the luxury of a week to prepare for Saturday’s league game in Galway, safe in the knowledge that their own place in next month’s FAI Cup final has been booked.

The win here came courtesy of a strong –"awesome," according to manager, John Caulfield – second-half performance and, in particular, two fine goals by Sean Maguire, whose remarkable form has now yielded 12 in just nine games.

“His training is phenomenal,” said Caulfield of the 22-year-old striker afterwards. “He keeps his feet on the ground which can be difficult for a young man. The rejection by West Ham has probably stood to him but then he probably came to the right club. I couldn’t speak too highly off him.”

He was certainly the hero again for City here. Alan Bennett had given the southerners the lead midway through the first half when he headed home Kevin O'Connor's corner from barely a yard out but Christy Fagan got the home side back level shortly before the end of a scrappy but relatively even first half with a decent header of his own.

That made it five straight cup games that Fagan has scored in but his wider strike rate has been poor and paltry by comparison with Maguire, whose second-half efforts here were numbers 23 and 24 of the season in all competitions.

The goals ensured that he eclipsed Greg Bolger to win the Man of the Match, although the home side's fans still got to let the former St Patrick's midfielder know what they thought of him when he was brought off a couple of minutes before time. That, though, was nothing as compared with the noise that greeted Billy Dennehy's departure towards the end of an afternoon on which not much went right for him. The visiting supporters gleefully mocked their former favourite while a portion of the locals abused him as though they regarded him as an opposition mole.

Maguire, meanwhile, could only be admired for the way he took his goals, with even Liam Buckley complimenting the first, a well placed header that left Brendan Clarke helpless. The one that really wrapped things up was an equally well taken shot from a tight angle, although poor defending undoubtedly played a major part too.

Caulfield, who lost Gearoid Morrissey early on to a hamstring problem, said he was delighted to have a cup final to look forward to again, but said the focus would now switch back to the league and the seven games his side must play before the end of a campaign he insists must finish on schedule.

"If it (a decision to extend it by a few days, as Stephen Kenny would like) was done five or six weeks ago then I think that would have been possible," he said. "But I think that now it's too late.

“I’d like a bit of reality about this,” he continued. “We’ve played six games in Europe and Dundalk have so far played eight, with one more to come before the end of the season. So at the end of the day, the difference between us and them is only three games over the course of the season and they’ve probably better able to cope with it because of the squad that they have.

“It’s about us,” he said. “We have seven games to go over the three weeks but we still feel we have a chance in the league.”

After that, they will have every chance in the cup final, whoever it is that they face, but there is a great deal to be resolved between now and November 6th and Caulfield and co are clearly determined to fight their corner both on and off the pitch.

ST PATRICK'S ATHLETIC: Clarke; O'Brien, D Dennehy, Hoare, Bermingham; Desmond; Byrne (Timlin, 75 mins), McGrath, Kelly (Barker, 75 mins), B Dennehy (Corcoran, 81 mins); Fagan.

CORK CITY: McNulty; Beattie, Bennett, Browne, O'Connor; G Morrissey (Holohan, 19 mins), Bolger (Healy, 88 mins); Sheppard, Buckley, Dooley; Maguire (O'Sullivan, 85 mins).

Referee: R Harvey (Dublin).