What the first year of the two-point arc in Cork club football tells us

Fri, 02 Jan, 2026 - 13:29

Jack McKay

In April, I looked at the early implementation of the two-point arc and how teams were engaging with it during the opening weeks of the Division 1 Football League.

At that point, St Finbarr’s, Carrigaline and Cill na Martra stood out for volume. All three were consistently finding the orange flag, and it raised a fair question about whether that willingness might translate into an edge when championship arrived.

As it turned out, all three went on to enjoy strong championship campaigns. But the relationship between success and two-point scoring was non-existent.

Cill na Martra were the outlier. They finished their Senior A championship with 13 two-pointers in five games, an average of 2.66 per game, higher than any Premier Senior side, and higher than their own league return.

The arc remained a feature of their game right through to the final.

For others, it didn’t.

St Finbarr’s and Carrigaline both saw a notable drop-off from their league output once championship began. They weren’t alone. St Michael’s and Castlehaven also averaged fewer two-pointers in championship than they had in the league.

Ideally, conversion rates would add another layer to this data. They would tell us who is shooting efficiently from outside the arc and who perhaps shouldn’t be. What can be tracked, though, is how often teams are able to generate long-range scores.

Steven Sherlock of St Finbarr's is tackled by Conor Flannery of Dingle during the AIB Munster GAA Football Senior Club Championship final at FBD Semple Stadium in Thurles. Picture: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

That’s where Newcestown come in. They topped the Premier Senior championship table for two-point scoring at 2.65 per game, and backed it up with a run to the semi-final, where they pushed Nemo Rangers to extra time.

This isn’t to diminish Newcestown – their quality is well established – but they would sit outside the traditional ‘big three’. And their semi-final run came with only one goal across the entire championship.

At the other end of the scale sat Ballincollig, joint-lowest for two-point returns at 0.60 per game, yet also semi-finalists. The difference? They found the net in every single championship outing.

After one season of football’s new rules, the Cork championship has not been transformed by the orange flag. Goals remain king and defensive strength still wins games.

But the arc has added a layer, an option that some teams can lean into, particularly those trying to bridge a gap.

Six teams reached the knockout stages. Three came from the top half of Premier Senior two-point scorers, three from the bottom half. But three of the four semi-finalists were in that top half.

That may be clutching at straws.

But in the top two grades at least, both sets of finalists used the two-point arc consistently. St Finbarr’s had the lowest per game average of those four teams with 1.50, while Knocknagree had 1.57 per game. The teams they beat, Nemo and Cill na Martra, both averaged over 2.00 per game.

So is it better to use the arc than not? Right now, it’s impossible to say. Even in the league, two-point scoring had little bearing on final standings. The overall influence of the arc is miniscule.

That, perhaps, mirrors what happened when the three-point line was first introduced in the NBA. Its arrival didn’t immediately reshape the game, that came later.