Pat Ryan laments 'terrible' second half

Cork manager Pat Ryan was left to rue a second half where Tipperary outworked his side in effecting a 21-point turnaround at Croke Park on Sunday.

Leading by 1-16 to 0-13 at half-time, Cork scored just two more points and conceded 3-14. It is the fifth straight final that the county has reached but not won – 2025 joining 2006, 2013, 2021 and 2024 – with the wait for the return of the Liam MacCarthy Cup now extending to a 21st year.

“We just got outworked really, to be honest with you,” Ryan said.

“They got great momentum behind themselves, got a few scores, got the crowd behind them, got a couple of breaks of the ball, a couple of goals they got, and obviously the sending-off.

“Credit to Tipperary, they came out and worked really, really hard. We were in a good position at half-time, but got blown away in the second half.

“Obviously, with the longer puckout and with the wind, they were able to target that side of it.

“Our momentum, our energy, was terrible in the second half and they had all the momentum, they had all the energy.

“They were the crowd that were working the hardest and that's the disappointing thing from our point of view.

“Obviously, it’s the second All-Ireland in a row that we've lost and we’re really, really disappointed with that second half.

“We didn't represent ourselves the way we should have represented ourselves, but credit to Tipperary, they came up, you could see they had loads of momentum behind them and they had a lot of good players all over the place.”

While the finishing position is the same as it was 364 days previously against Clare, that was a 90-minute epic that went to the wire, just a point separating the sides after extra time. Having been humbled in such a fashion, defeat was naturally tougher for Ryan and the team to swallow.

“Yeah, of course it is, of course it is,” he said.

“You want to perform, Last year, you came away with a good bit of pride in the way we performed and the epic game it was.

“In fairness, second half petered out and that was disappointing from our point of view.”

As the game slipped away, Cork’s travails were underlined by goal chances that went close but came to nothing and moves that broke down. That the process malfunctioned was probably the most disappointing thing for Ryan.

“We were chasing it,” he said, “they had the momentum and we didn't use the ball well enough.

“I think we probably played a bit more as individuals, that's something we spoke about.

Trying to make sure that, when things go against you, you keep playing as a team and keep sticking to the process and keep sticking to what we want to do, those half-balls inside and taking that extra pass.

“We didn't do it; we had three balls off the post, where we could have carried those balls in and made those scores. Look, at the end of the day, look, it's hard to find bits and pieces when Tipperary just blew us away in the second half.”