Conor Lehane blitz floors Tipp as Rebels’ rise gathers some compelling pace

Cork 3-30 Tipperary 1-24

Tim O'Mahony of Cork (right) celebrates with team-mate Darragh Fitzgibbon after scoring their side's third goal against at FBD Semple Stadium in Thurles, Tipperary. Photo: Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile

Vincent Hogan Twitter Email

May 23 2022 02:30 AM

For Tipperary, this stark day curdled into what surely felt like hurling’s equivalent of being inside a barrel, going over Niagara Falls.

Cork ate them without salt on their own field, essentially ignoring the inconvenience of a slow start to devour men whose championship ambitions are now over, but whose summer might yet pitch them into a relegation battle if Kerry win the Joe McDonagh.

That game, should it happen, will take place on June 25 and quite how Colm Bonnar can energise a clearly devastated group to work towards what, for now, remains a hypothetical assignment only he will know. The idea of a 2023 hurling championship without Tipp probably remains fanciful, but that is their potential predicament after a whitewash in the Munster round-robin.

This registers as their second heaviest ever summer loss to Cork, their worst since 1942 and the sixth consecutive championship defeat for a county that, of course, welcomed home the All-Ireland champions just three years ago.

The scenario they awake to today did seem unlikely when Tipp raced into a 1-3 to 0-0 lead inside five minutes here, but that opening was just spinning mischief. True, it took a remarkable trip-switch moment to reset the balance but, once it happened, the remainder became a cold exercise in book-keeping.

The moment in question was an 11th-minute Noel McGrath penalty snapping back off a town-end post and, seconds later, Alan Connolly goaling at the Killinan End. A six-point turnaround, Tipp now just a point ahead instead of seven.

And yet what followed settled into such an easy rhythm of Cork dominance, it would be naïve to suggest that this contest was ever headed for any conclusion other than audited in such unforgiving digits.

So Cork – all but laid out on a slab in some eyes two weeks back – now come racing back into the Liam MacCarthy conversation as Munster’s third qualifiers. They have done so, you suspect, by remembering who they are in the game. In other words, by hurling with a degree of freedom as distinct from the anxious, over-prescriptive style that so diminished them in the early weeks of this championship.

That said, it remains a moot point how much of that was facilitated by a Tipp team that looked innately callow. Conor Lehane took a succession of markers on a horror-ride here, finishing the day with 0-7 from play despite essentially settling into a kind of casual quarterback role.

Morgan actually won the first two balls between him and the Midleton flier only to then bear painful witness to an opponent clearly determined to make up for his omission from the Cork squad in 2021.

“The year off was what it was,” reflected Lehane afterwards.

Jake Morris had Tipp off to a lightning start, goaling just 38 seconds in with a smart one-handed finish. But when Fitzgibbon was then allowed run 50 yards unchecked down the Kinane Stand side before firing home a shot that Barry Hogan probably should have saved, it was already clear that this was a Tipp team in deep, deep trouble.

That goal made it 2-5 to 1-4 to Cork after 15 minutes and, with Lehane now unstoppable, they free-wheeled from there to the interval, going in eight points ahead.

A margin that, in psychological terms, already approximated to an ocean.

Barrett was off with what looked a bad hamstring pull just five minutes after the resumption, another blow faithful to what Bonnar has been enduring all championship. And with Ciarán Joyce and Mark Coleman now storming into the game in Cork’s half-back line, Tipp’s mission was already an exercise in damage limitation.

Substitute Alan Flynn then got the line for a straight red on the hour, referee – Seán Stack – indicating that the Kiladangan man had been guilty of intemperate use of the hurley.

By then, the margin was already out to 10, only Noel McGrath and Jason Forde keeping the Killinan end umpires warm. The sheer efficacy of Cork’s third goal spoke volumes for their ultimate ease of passage.

Tommy O’Connell worked a low ball down the left wing to Fitzgibbon who improvised wonderfully to flick a cross between his legs to the in-rushing Tim O’Mahony who easily found Hogan’s net without needing to take the ball to hand.

Cork were 15 clear now and, frankly, already in another time-zone.

They face the McDonagh Cup winners next in a preliminary All-Ireland quarter-final, their championship pulse beating strongly again.

And Tipp? A hard winter in the salt-mines looms.

SCORERS – Cork: C Lehane 0-8 (1f); P Horgan 0-5 (3f, 1 ’65); S Kingston 0-4; A Connolly, T O’Mahony 1-1 each; R O’Flynn, S Harnedy 0-3 each; M Coleman 0-3 (1f); D Fitzgibbon 1-0; J O’Connor 0-2. Tipperary: N McGrath 0-13 (12f); J Forde 0-5; J Morris 1-2; D Quirke, C Stakelum, P Maher, R Maher 0-1 (f) each.

CORK – P Collins 7; N O’Leary 7, R Downey 8, S O’Donoghue 7; D Cahalane 6, C Joyce 8, M Coleman 8; D Fitzgibbon 8, L Meade 7; R O’Flynn 8, P Horgan 7, C Lehane 9; S Kingston 8, S Harnedy 7, A Connolly 7. Subs: T O’Mahony 8 for Horgan (45 mins), T O’Connell 7 for Meade (57), J O’Connor 7 for O’Flynn (60), G Millerick for Downey (66), S Barrett for Lehane (66).

TIPPERARY – Barry Hogan 6; C Barrett 7, R Maher 8, C Morgan 6; D Quirke 7, S Kennedy 6, B Heffernan 6; C Stakelum 7, D McCormack 6; G Browne 6, N McGrath 8, M Breen 6; J Forde 8, M Kehoe 6, J Morris 7. Subs: A Flynn 5 for Heffernan (h-t), P Maher 6 for Browne (h-t), J Quigley 6 for Barrett (40), C Bowe 6 for Breen (47), G O’Connor for McCormack (69).

REF – S Stack (Dublin)