1985 a year of regret for Cork and Justin McCarthy

As outlined in a piece last week, years ending in ‘5’ have not been kind to Cork hurling.

From 1941-46, the county won five All-Irelands, with 1945 the only exception, while the Munster championship of 1975 was not built upon as the Rebels suffered a first-ever championship loss to Galway at the All-Ireland semi-final stage.

That year, Justin McCarthy had served as coach to the team but he was not invited back for what would become the three-in-a-row. A decade on, McCarthy’s brief tenure as manager came to ground with another semi-final defeat to the Tribesmen.

McCarthy had persuaded enough of his fellow selectors to back him as manager, despite members of the county board executive favouring Johnny Clifford. As he recounted in his autobiography, Hooked, a throwaway remark by him, that fellow selector Fr Michael O’Brien could give him a hand, was seized upon and all official communications from the board listed the two as joint-managers.

McCarthy maintained that, after the selectors won that battle, he knew they would be out of jobs the moment Cork lost a championship game under their watch.

Of course, they won the centenary All-Ireland and were favourites facing into 1985 but McCarthy had a nagging feeling that the celebrations had gone on for too long. They got over Limerick in their Munster SHC semi-final at Páirc Uí Chaoimh on June 16, with the Midleton-powered midfield of John Fenton (1-5) and Pat Hartnett (0-3) central to a 2-13 to 1-9 win.

The following week, Tipperary would beat Clare in a replay to set up a repeat of the previous year’s provincial decider, when the Premier County had thrown away a four-point lead with time almost up to lose by four – in the process denying themselves the chance to win the All-Ireland at home.

In Hooked, McCarthy said that word got back to him that Tipp were leaving no stone unturned in the lead-up to the ’85 final. So determined were they to emerge victorious, in fact, that they would be resurrecting the infamous ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ take-no-prisoners tactics of the ‘50s and ‘60s.

McCarthy’s response to that was simple: he told his side not to go looking for any trouble, but at the same time not to walk away from it either should it rear its head.

In brilliant sunshine, the encounter in front of almost 50,000 was not for the faint-hearted and the tempo was set with five goals inside the opening 20 minutes.

When Jimmy Barry-Murphy struck for the fifth of those, Cork led by 3-3 to 2-2 and at half-time it was 3-6 to 2-7. Tipp’s half-back line began to dominate early in the second half and they were level again when Liam Maher netted but Fenton pointed immediately and then converted his second penalty in as many games.

It finished 4-17 to 4-11 and in the week after the game, McCarthy gave an interview to The Cork Examiner’s Val Dorgan, where he criticised Tipp’s roughhouse tactics. Tipperary were so insulted that they threatened never to play in Cork again, and indeed it would be five years before they would do so.

If the weather for the Munster final was the most perfect for hurling, the semi-final in Croke Park was the opposite, with just 8,205 present. Cork were also hampered by the pre-match loss of Barry-Murphy through injury, but the decision to play against the wind in the first half seemed to be vindicated as they trailed by just a point, 1-7 to 2-3, at half-time.

They had Ger Cunningham to thank for a string of saves, with the goals coming from Fenton (penalty) and Kieran Kingston. Instead of kicking on in the second half, however, Cork struggled.

Kevin Hennesy’s goal briefly put them in front early in the second half but from there Galway were rampant. Bernie Forde and PJ Molloy shone in the westerners’ attack and the lead extended to a full 10 points before Fenton threatened to instigate a comeback, managing to score two goals in quick succession.

There wasn’t enough time, though, and the final score of 4-12 to 5-5 didn’t flatter the victors.

As McCarthy predicted, the management’s services were dispensed with and he regretted the lack of an opportunity to play Galway on a fine day – the result of the 1986 All-Ireland final would prove those regrets right.