ALL-IRELAND SHC SEMI-FINAL:CORK ARE back to full strength for Sunday's All-Ireland hurling semi-final with Kilkenny at Croke Park. Denis Walsh's team welcome back Shane O'Neill and Seán Óg Ó hAilpín from injury and they slot into their usual places at right-corner back and left-half back respectively.
There is one further change to the team that beat Antrim in the quarter-finals. Patrick Horgan returns at right-corner forward in place of Paudie O’Sullivan.
Former Hurler of the Year Jerry O’Connor is also fit again, but starts on the bench.
The counties will be meeting for the 25th time in the All-Ireland series, a sequence going back over three centuries to the 1893 championship. Maybe surprisingly, given Cork’s long-term position at top of the game’s roll of honour, a status Kilkenny finally claimed only during the current team’s run of All-Irelands, it is the Leinster champions who have a clear lead in the head-to-head meetings.
Kilkenny have won 15 of the encounters and Cork eight with two (the famous 1931 final which went to second replay) drawn.
Dinny Cahill, the Tipperary man who manages Antrim, the team Cork beat the last day, believes the odds of 5 to 1 on a win for the Munster men is good value against the hitherto rampant champions.
“People are completely underestimating Cork. I fancy them to do well. They played very good hurling against Tipperary and there was only the puck of a ball between them and Waterford in both of the Munster final games. I don’t think they’ve shown their hand all year.”
Cahill feels that Cork can use the size of Aisake Ó hAilpín and Michael Cussen to prevent Kilkenny’s half backs creating the customary platform.
“I think they’ll bring their two big men out to the wing and stop them winning aerial ball. Cussen and Aisake will play on Tommy Walsh and JJ Delaney, with Niall McCarthy at centre forward to try and stop them winning ball and sending long deliveries down to the forwards.
“It’s been said that Kilkenny are most vulnerable in the semi-finals and I think that’s correct.”
There has, however, been friction between the counties in recent years with Kilkenny handing Cork a 30-point beating in Denis Walsh’s first match in charge.
That was followed by critical comments in Cork goalkeeper Dónal Óg Cusack’s autobiography, which has been the focus of hostile remarks by distinguished former Kilkenny hurlers.
“Donal Óg Cusack’s book and his ungracious (and, to be honest, totally unnecessary) comments about Kilkenny hit a nerve, not just with the players, but with Kilkenny supporters at large,” said former GAA president and All-Ireland medallist Nickey Brennan in his column in the Kilkenny People.
Brennan’s former team-mate and scoring legend Eddie Keher, who had taken public issue with the Cork hurlers’ strike of two years ago and was in turn criticised in Cusack’s book, had strong words to say.
“I wouldn’t touch it (the book) with a 40-foot pole . . . straight into the bin. All I have heard about it, and maybe I’m wrong to make judgment, is third party things said about me and Kilkenny generally, totally out or order for a current player to make.”
CORK: D Cusack; S O’Neill, E Cadogan, B Murphy; J Gardiner, R Curran, S Ó hAilpín; T Kenny, C Naughton; M Cussen, K Murphy, N McCarthy; P Horgan, A Ó hAilpín, B O’Connor. Subs: M Coleman, S Murphy, R Ryan, W Egan, J O’Connor, L McLoughlin, G Callanan, P O’Sullivan, C McCarthy, A Nash, E Dillon, P Cronin, M Walsh, M O’Sullivan, L O’Farrell.
