Meath Tiptoe Out With A Wimper Against Cork

All Ireland SFC Semi-Final
Cork 1-16
Meath 0-9

By Dermot Kavanagh

The quirkiness of sport was never more clearly demonstrated than at Croke Park on Sunday.

Meath, possibly the best team of the year so far, reserved their most iodine display to date in what was their most important game so far this season.

Already this year Meath have won Division Two of the National League. In the qualifiers they put highly fancied Galway and most people's favourites Tyrone to the sword. Yet when the demand was greatest Meath's response was weakest. Sunday's game was not only about Meath though; Cork came to Croke Park with very mixed credentials.

Their best game so far was their one-point defeat by Kerry in the Munster final.

Their last two wins in the qualifiers, over Louth and Sligo, were far from impressive and sufficiently lacklustre to say that they went into Sunday's game as clear underdogs.

Their failure to impress in the 2005 and 2006 semi final defeats further eroded the pundit's confidence in them.

How wrong everyone was in both their assessment of both teams.

Apart from some brief moments in the opening half, there really was only one team that looked like likely winners and worthy All Ireland finalists.

Cork were quickest to settle and from an early stage it was clear that their defence was not going to stand aside and allow the Meath forwards to run riot as the injury crippled Tyrone defence had done in a quarter-final game recently.

In this regard, Graham Canty at fullback and Noel O'Leary and Ger Spillane in the half back line were particularly unbeatable.

This was the first time this season that the Meath attack met such determined defending, a development to which they had no answer.

Another troublesome area for Meath was at midfield where Cork's Nicholas Murphy and Derek Kavanagh outplayed Meath's Nigel Crawford and Mark Ward in practically every facet of midfield play.

With a continuous supply of good ball from midfield and with the benefit of a strong defence, the Cork attack enjoyed the rare luxury of being able to play the type of game that best suited them.

They neglected to drop high balls into Michael Cussen as their only tactic. Instead they mixed that approach with a clever short passing game that seems best to suit the attacking individual skills.

Such was the ease by which the Cork attack carried out their duties that for once their tally of wides was in single figures, just nine in all.

Cork led at the break by eight points to six but the scoreboard did not at all reflect their superiority.

Whatever misrepresentation the scoreboard made of the first half exchanges, the scoreboard at the end of the game certainly was clinically accurate as to the trend of the game.

In that second period Cork outscored Meath by 1-8 to 0-3. In that period Meath scored their 7th point in the 37th minute.

They did not score again until the 64th minute - a gap of 27 minutes filled with fruitless endeavour.

Cork on the other-hand did not appear to miss the attacking skills of their top scorer, James Masters.

While Meath were without Anthony Moyles, one of their better players all season it is stretching credibility to suggest that, were he available that the result would be any different.

Of concern to Cork will be the poor attendance of just 37,640; the Cork supporters were outnumbered by at least four to one.

Of further and more damaging concern will be the fate of their abrasive wing back Noel O'Leary who was seen on camera to have punched Meath's Graham Geraghty in the face.

How ironic it would be if O'Leary were to miss the final for a punch on one of the games most maligned anti-heroes.