Cork's 'clutch' football clubs: Who are the best football teams to get out of a tight spot

Returning to our Christmas Eve question – which clubs are the best clutch performers in one-score games? – we turn to analyse the football championships.

We’ve examined teams’ results in one-score games over the past five seasons to reveal who kept their calm to get over the line and who fell just short of the winning post.

The current Cork football champions across the five county-wide grades naturally rank highly on this metric, coming in second, fourth, ninth, 13th, and 18th of the 62 clubs included.

The correlation is greater than hurling, perhaps due to its higher-scoring nature. In the small-ball game, the county champions ranked eighth, 11th, 22nd, 45th, and 57th.

Russell Rovers, for example, have reached an All-Ireland JHC final while winning each of their games by seven points or more.

When it comes to football, the big three of Castlehaven, Nemo Rangers, and St Finbarr’s all rank towards the top end.

The Haven, back-to-back Premier Senior champions, sit fourth with a 73% success rate in one-score games (eight wins, three losses, with draws excluded).

The winning margins demonstrate their increasing superiority in the past year.

In 2023, they drew with Carbery Rangers and had just one score to spare against Clonakilty, Ballincollig, the Barrs, and Nemo. In 2024, they won all their games by four points or more.

Nemo’s reputation for getting over the line is endorsed as they place third on these rankings. The city side have won 75% of their one-score games since 2020 (nine wins, three draws).

The aberrations were the 2023 final defeat to the Haven and 2021, when they narrowly lost two group games within weeks of winning the delayed 2020 final.

Ahead of them in second are Kilmurry with an 83% success rate from six one-score games (five wins, one loss).

They are only denied a perfect record by the late winning goal in the 2023 Premier Junior final against the Barrs’ second team.

They took their time to work through the gears in 2024 but ground out one-point victories over Cobh, St James’, and parish-rivals Canovee to make up for their heartbreak a year previous.

They have since translated that momentum into a Munster title and now lie just an hour away from a trip to Croke Park for an All-Ireland final.

TOP OF THE CHARTS

Taking our Christmas number one are Aghabullogue with an 86% win record in one-score games (six wins, one loss).

Since August 2020, they have won all five of their matches which were decided by one score. The asterisk on that is their drawn Premier Intermediate final with Kilshannig this autumn, which the Glantane club won in a replay.

A handful of other Premier Senior clubs to figure well include Valley Rovers in fifth (five wins, two losses) and the Barrs and Mallow in joint-ninth (six wins, three draws).

Newly promoted Carrigaline have an identical record to the latter duo. Having come out the wrong side a couple of times in their 2023 relegation, their final four games en route to the Senior A crown were all decided by two points or less, while one required penalties.

Speaking of shoot-outs, the luckless Kanturk have played in the most games decided by one score in the past five years.

Of their 14 such contests, they have won eight and lost six. They have not exited the championship by more than one score in that time.

Their last two eliminations were on penalties against the eventual champions. Two more were tight Premier Intermediate final defeats, while they won that competition in 2022.

In Intermediate A, Glanmire got over the line with three consecutive one-point wins to improve their record down the stretch (four wins, three losses).

Strangely, Fermoy’s high placing in the hurling rankings (six wins, one loss) is the inverse of their football performance (one win, six losses). They have been beaten in their last five one-score games since August 2020.

Ilen Rovers and Glenville (one win, five losses) fare no better. Two of Ilen’s relegations have been confirmed by one-score defeats, while the same applied to Glenville’s 2023 drop.

Uibh Laoire, meanwhile, haven’t registered a one-score win since strolling to back-to-back county titles in 2020 and ’21. Their Premier Intermediate progress has been halted by four one-score losses.

Premier Senior side Clonakilty hold the longest losing streak in one-score games. They won a series of nail-biters to make the 2021 final but since then, they have lost six on the spin.

That includes three one-pointers, two two-pointers, a penalty shoot-out, and they have drawn three further games.

Best records in games decided by one score since 2020:

86% – Aghabullogue 6-1.

83% – Kilmurry 5-1.

75% – Nemo Rangers 9-3.

73% – Castlehaven 8-3.

71% – Valley Rovers, Boherbue, St Finbarr’s second team 5-2.

70% – Knocknagree 7-3.