Darragh Ó Sé: Cork should have beaten Kerry - what they do next is crucial

Arriving down to Páirc Uí Chaoimh on Saturday evening, the mood was sombre and the weather was foul. It reminded me of a McGrath Cup game in the depths of winter, when you’re already thinking of getting out of there even before things get started.

It didn’t help that so many people had completely written off Cork. Including myself. I did question if they were hurting enough, had any of the old anger on their side when it came to playing Kerry. And despite my best efforts, I couldn’t make an argument for Cork getting anywhere close.

Now, the last thing I’m going to do is take any credit for Cork’s performance, although a few Cork people did remind me afterwards of what I’d said. In my defence, it was very hard to see that performance coming from Cork.

For a good while after the game started, and even with about 15,000 people there, the place felt dead. From a Cork point of view it was all too pedestrian. It was midway through the first half, after Kerry went up 0-7 to 0-1, when of all a sudden Cork just got stuck in. The crowd, in fairness, got behind them, the players got a lot more ...
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