Darragh Fitzgibbon: 'You need a bit of fight and edge, Ben O'Connor is only relaying the same message Pat Ryan and Kieran Kingston did...'

Cork captain Darragh Fitzgibbon said new manager Ben O'Connor isn't encouraging the Rebels to play anymore 'on the edge' than any other county.

Cork won 0-29 to 0-22 at SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh but only after Shane Barrett and Jason Forde were red-carded before half-time. Liam Gordon made the call following a scrap between Alan Connolly and Willie Connors which eventually saw the pair receive yellow cards but led to a dust-up between the rivals.

Selected as the RTE Man of the Match after sniping 0-7, five from play, Fitzgibbon dismissed the suggestion that O'Connor has added a nastiness to the Rebels.

"Like every other manager is doing you know," he explained. "You have to have a bit of fight and edge because if you don't, you're not going to win.

"I think there's a bit much being made out of it in the media and he's a top-class guy. He's just relaying the same message that Pat Ryan and Kieran Kingston did before you know?

If we're not on it, we won't win any of these big games and that's what he's relaying to us."

He didn't have any insight into the red cards themselves.

"I was on the other side of the field. I suppose the ref had to send a guy off from either side because it was escalating."

Darragh Fitzgibbon is awarded man of the match and says he felt tonight's win meant more to them than Tipp being at home in front of a large crowd.

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The league and Munster winners beat the All-Ireland champions but Fitzgibbon acknowledged the game was more important to the Leesiders with a Munster championship rematch looming in Thurles on April 19.

"It's just important for the group to see what we're doing at training reflected on the field and obviously it probably meant more to us than Tipperary, being at home and having lost the All-Ireland last year.

"The boys that got the 15 jerseys did really, really well and we've got two weeks off now to regroup after the three games we've had so far."

With three wins in a row, Cork are in a strong position to return to the league final but are away to Kilkenny and then Limerick in the space of six days at the start of March. They drew an incredible 30,910 on Saturday night but aren't at home again until Saturday, March 21, against Offaly.

"It's unbelievable like. I mean everybody here would dream of playing down the Páirc in front of 30,000 people. Every young lad in Cork is going home dreaming of doing that someday.

"It's such a privilege to be here. You're not even nervous coming to these matches anymore, it's just excitement and you're trying to do your best for the crowd and I think we did that."

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As for Saturday's victory atoning for their All-Ireland final hammering by Tipp? The only priority is qualifying from Munster

"It doesn't but we've moved on. We've done a load of work on the training field to get better and it's made us better as a group. 

It's forced us to be better but we know there's huge challenges coming and all that matters is being one of the three teams that come out of Munster.

"That's the goal and that hasn't changed tonight because we won and it wouldn't have changed if we lost."