ALL-IRELAND SFC QUARTER-FINAL Cork 1-16 Roscommon 0-10:THE MOST anti-climactic of the weekend's GAA All-Ireland football quarter-finals ended as expected with Cork advancing to a sixth successive semi-final.
Surprise Connacht champions Roscommon pushed the issue rather more vigorously than had been expected but they still finished nine points off the at-times hesitant pace set by the favourites from Munster.
Roscommon manager Fergal O’Donnell can look back on a fine season and a creditable sign-off but his counterpart, Conor Counihan, couldn’t have expected to be feeling so troubled after two days that saw the departure of both Kerry and Tyrone, leaving only one county in the final four – next opponents Dublin – who have beaten Cork in championship in living memory.
Of most concern will be the hamstring injury to Graham Canty, which forced the captain off in the closing minutes, but Ciarán Sheehan also had to go off in the 68th minute by which stage there were no replacements left, although by then Cork were out of sight and opening up goal chances more or less at will even if they only availed of one.
Adding to the nagging sense of unease must be the uncertain form of so many players.
Three of the young blades who were supposed to be bringing a sharper edge to the team and helping it to evolve beyond the disappointments of the past were taken off at half-time.
Jamie O’Sullivan, Aidan Walsh and Colm O’Neill were all replaced by some of the panel’s more venerable instititions, John Miskella, Nicholas Murphy and Donncha O’Connor, who further complicated matters by playing well.
There was also the recurrent nightmare at full back where Michael Shields, having thrived so much earlier this season at half-back, had been consigned by the team’s needs. He was switched to corner back for the second half with Canty, another better suited to a more advanced posting, now confined to the edge of the square.
Nonetheless the main consideration for Counihan is that his team have become the only remaining survivors of football’s leading troika in recent seasons. It’s frequently difficult to manage raging, odds-on favouritism and Cork struggled even if the must-win context never slipped back as far as might-lose.
Roscommon did hit the front shortly into the second half but Cork quickly regained the initiative. More impressively the Connacht champions recovered from a poor beginning to leave the match in the balance at half-time.
Easing in front with a couple of points by Daniel Goulding, Cork were dominant in the opening stages, feasting on possession and pressing forward but the attacks were sluggish and although 0-5 to 0-1 ahead by the 23rd minute, it was evident early on that this would be no re-run of the trimming handed to Donegal 12 months previously.
Around the 15-minute mark there were signs of flatness. Ciarán Sheehan, who was the most consistent of the younger generation players, missed the hop of the ball and Colm O’Neill fumbled into touch when it ran for him.
A lateral movement right across, rather than up, the field ended in Paddy Kelly kicking a wide.
The trouble for Roscommon was that they weren’t making the best of their chances. After a marvellous opening point kicked from the left by Donal Shine, the scoreboard then seized up. Ger Heneghan had a good chance that went wide and Shine hit his first free off the post and Cathal Cregg was off-target with a line ball.
But the underdogs weren’t giving up and their enthusiasm was evident in Cregg’s tracking back to block a shot by Walsh in the 22nd minute.
David O’Gara and John Rogers cut the deficit and after Cork came close to goal – Pearse O’Neill forcing Geoffrey Claffey into conceding a 45 – Shine added another couple to reduce the half-time deficit to a single point, 0-5 to 0-6.
Counihan made the switches and although both of Roscommon’s midfielders, Michael Finneran and Karol Mannion, kicked early points to push the Connacht side ahead, Murphy’s arrival increased Cork’s productivity in the middle.
Cork responded in the third quarter with a run of five points to re-establish control.
Sheehan moved out to the wing at half-time and did well enough on Seán Purcell to force Colm Garvey’s introduction, scoring the first of the sequence of five before points followed from Goulding, Donncha O’Connor, O’Neill and Paul Kerrigan.
A clear-cut goal chance in the 57th minute fell to Canty on the overlap. His decision to take the fisted point at first seemed merely conservative but then a greater cost materialised, as the Cork captain pulled up sharply and had to leave the field.
The next goal chance fell five minutes later after the lively Paudie Kissane had nipped in to intercept a wayward ball but misplaced the pass to Kerrigan.
Finally the green flag rose after Donncha O’Connor had robbed David Casey and sent O’Neill in on goal for a precise finish and the effective conclusion to the match.
Three minutes later O’Connor again set up a goal chance, which ended with Goulding being fouled for a penalty. O’Connor contented himself with a point.
Now well placed for a first All-Ireland in 20 years Cork will settle for the win and hope for improvement in the season-defining weeks to come.
