Christy O'Connor on Cork v Kerry: Do Rebels really believe they can pull off a shock?

Seconds after Danny Miskella’s goal for the Cork U20s in Tralee eight days ago, Kerry won the kick-out and drove up the field where Odhran Ferris kicked an excellent two-pointer.

Goals have always had a valuable currency in the modern game but their value has been reduced with two-pointers, especially frees outside the arc.

Ferris’s effort was an excellent score. The game was long over by that stage, but it was almost Kerry’s way of telling Cork that a green flag was in no way going to add a layer of makeup to another ugly defeat.

The final margin was 10 points but Kerry were probably angry for taking their foot off the gas and not making the deficit as wide as the gulf between the sides appeared.

Kerry were ahead by 15 points in the 52nd minute before Cork finally shook themselves to hit an unanswered 1-4 before Ferris’ score ensured that the margin finished at double-digits.

WIDENING

Cork are still in this championship. They need to win at home against Tipperary this evening to have any chance of getting another crack at Kerry again in a Munster final. Even if they do, how much will Cork have bridged a gap that looks to be widening between the counties at this level?

Cork were without three of their best forwards – Ed Myers, Dara Sheedy and Brian Hayes – but Kerry were without two of their outstanding players too in Ben Murphy and Cormac Dillon.

Kerry are one of the favourites for the All-Ireland but another defeat didn’t disguise another Cork beatdown. Since Cork last overcame their neighbours at this level, in the 2021 Munster semi-final, Kerry’s average winning margin in their five meetings is a shade below 0-8.

A number of these players played on the minor team that defeated Kerry in the 2023 final but Kerry teams have spent the intervening period reminding Cork of their place in the relationship – right across the board.

Kerry annihilated Cork in last year’s Munster minor final by 15 points. Some of the players who featured last week also felt that pain at colleges level this year, especially at Corn Uí Mhuirí. In the three games Cork schools lost to Kerry schools in the knockout stages of the competition, the aggregate winning margin was 47 points.

Cork goalkeeper Billy Curtin has got used to seeing balls flying over his head from Kerry players this year; Curtin was part of the Hamilton High School Bandon side that were hammered by Mercy Mounthawk in the Corn Uí Mhuirí semi-final by 20 points.

It has become a too familiar pattern that has fed into Cork’s struggles to cope with Kerry at senior level anymore. Cork did beat Kerry at U20 in 2019 and 2021 but in the six other knockout matches Cork have lost to Kerry at U20 in the last eight years, the average losing margin is 10 points.

On the other hand, do those underage struggles make it easier again to accept the gap between the teams at senior level? Or is the gap as wide as it appears at senior? 

In their last two championship meetings – the 2023 round robin and 2024 Munster semi-final – Kerry have only won by margins of two and three points respectively.

Kerry were pushed hard last year by a Cork side that arrived into Killarney loaded with intent and ambition, showing none of the hesitation that had crippled them so often in the past in these games.

Cork did drop off and go more zonal in the second half. They offered up the Kerry kick-out, but it still took Kerry until the 50th minute to get ahead. Even when they did, and were expected to drive on, Cork continued to dig in and make Kerry grind hard for every score.

It will be harder for Cork to create those conditions now with the new rules. Even when Cork dug the trenches in the second half last year, Kerry still had double the amount of shots than them.

They just weren’t accurate enough that afternoon to punish Cork more. That was an issue for Kerry too in the All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Armagh, but Kerry have been shooting the lights out since the last couple of rounds of the league.

MENACE

Returning players, better weather and the revised rules have made Kerry look a more menacing team in recent weeks whereas it’s been much harder to get a full read on Cork, and on where they are really at.

Cork’s inconsistency hasn’t been helped by the constant turnover of players, which was higher again this winter with so many lost to injury, retirement or just taking time out of inter-county football. Yet while Cork have lost some good players, they haven’t lost a batch of marquee players that would have left them more vulnerable to being exposed by Kerry now.

Although every team is supremely conditioned, one of the key factors in last year’s game was how Cork’s tank was running dry with gas from late in the first half, which is another byproduct of a Division 2 team struggling to stay with a seasoned Division 1 side.

That will be difficult for Cork to override again now but their last two meetings still proved that Cork are capable of worrying Kerry. 

And while Kerry are never afraid of Cork, they still carry a constant anxiety about the idea of losing to them.

Similar to last week’s U20 game, there is a gulf in class between Kerry and Cork for Sunday’s game. So everything again boils down to how much the Cork players really believe that an upset is possible.