Supreme Cork reach seventh heaven
When Briege Corkery came up from wing-back to hoist the best score of the half on 27 minutes, it put Cork seven ahead. Sarah Houlihan and Orlagh Farmer swapped scores to make it 0-10 to 0-3 at the break.
It was hard to see where a Kerry revival might come from. Their defensive set-up meant they played with just three forwards for most of the game and once Stack worked out how best to deal with the high ball into Scanlon, Cork were set fair. Patrice Dennehy carried the fight when she came off the bench and her fine point on 46 minutes got Kerry back to within six points but that was as good as it got. When Nollaig Cleary and the tireless Geraldine O’Flynn kicked two in a minute soon after, there was only the countdown to the hooter left.
“They did what they normally do,” said Ryan. “They worked unbelievably hard for each other. They made some fierce bad mistakes but there was no recriminations, no pointing of fingers, no heads down. They just got on with the game. They seem to understand sport is an inexact science and that you are going to make mistakes and they understand that the faster you get over them the better your performance.
“That showed, with some unbelievably good players doing some unbelievably bad things. But they still had the character to do some good things too. They are very mature. They have lots of qualities and you couldn’t but admire them. It is very easy to work with them.”
CORK:E Harte; AM Walsh, B Stack, D O’Reilly; B Corkery (0-1), R Buckley, G O’Flynn (0-2); J Murphy, N Kelly; O Farmer (0-1), D O’Sullivan (0-4), C O’Sullivan; N Cleary (0-1), V Mulcahy (0-7, six frees), R Ní Bhuachalla. Subs: O Finn for Ní Bhuachalla, Angela Walsh for Ann Marie Walsh (both 39 mins), L McMahon for Farmer (46 mins), Annie Walsh for C O’Sullivan (58 mins), A Hutchings for Kelly, 63 mins.
KERRY: E Murphy; C Lynch, A Leonard, A Lyons; J Brosnan, A Desmond, C Kelly; L Scanlon (0-2), B Breen; S Houlihan (0-3, two frees), E Sherwood, L Galvin; M O’Connell, D Corridan, L Ní Muircheartaigh (0-1, free). Subs: P Dennehy (0-1) for Corridan (23 mins), Corridan for O’Connell (43 mins), M Fitzgerald for Galvin (45 mins), SJ Joy for Sherwood (59 mins).
Referee: G Corrigan (Down).
