Cork North Central was the most predictable of the five Cork constituencies after it was reduced to a four-seater and it went very much to form.
The four sitting TDs, Billy Kelleher and Noel O'Flynn of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael's Bernard Allen and Labour's Kathleen Lynch were returned.
Fianna Fáil polled 41.48 per cent here in 2002, but without retiring TD Danny Wallace the party was always likely to see its vote drop and that's exactly what happened. Kelleher and O'Flynn pulled in a combined vote for the party of 35.74 per cent.
This time, however, Kelleher came home as poll topper, taking 22.33 per cent of first preferences to be elected on the first count, with O'Flynn ending up with 13.41 per cent. He had possibly lost the support of some Fianna Fáil voters over his criticism of the Government's management of the health service.
Fine Gael increased its vote share from 20.38 per cent to 27.57 per cent, with Allen taking 16.21 per cent of first preferences. While his running mate Gerry Kelly fared better than most pundits had predicted, he suffered from a lack of fellow county-based candidates to supply him with transfers.
Allen was elected on the seventh count along with Lynch who increased her vote only marginally from 11.77 per cent to 12.33 per cent, but got good transfers from fellow left-leaning candidates, Sinn Féin's Jonathan O'Brien, Mick Barry of the Socialist Party and Chris O'Leary of the Greens.
Former Fianna Fáil councillor Dave McCarthy ran as an independent and took votes from both O'Brien and O'Flynn.
However, O'Flynn still had almost 2,000 votes to spare over Kelly and was elected without reaching the quota.
Overall change: redrawn
Outgoing TDs
Noel O'Flynn FF
Billy Kelleher FF
Dan Wallace FF
Bernard Allen FG
Kathleen LynchLab
