Four-timers from Leeside still unique

Cork between 1941-44 became the only county to win four successive All-Irelands and, in the current cut-throat environment, it's hard to imagine the achievement being emulated for the foreseeable future.

None of the four finals were particularly memorable and Cork won all of them by a street - the margins of victory averaged 17 points.

This devastating superiority was as true of the fourth success as it was of the first. As a result, the 1944 final's claims on history are strictly contextual. Cork beat Dublin by 2-13 to 1-2 to create the record which still stands. Yet there was more to the team's record than that straight sequence of success.

Starting in 1939 and finishing in 1948, the team won a further title in 1946, but also lost two finals by a single point - both to Kilkenny - and in the three other years, were defeated in Munster by the eventual All-Ireland winners.

Cork's five All-Irelands in six years constitute an unequalled level of consistent achievement; not even Mick O'Dwyer's Kerry footballers managed to emulate it.

Nearest comparisons come not from this century but 100 years ago, when Tipperary also won five titles in six years, but at a time when different clubs represented the county. Cork's four All-Irelands were won using 25 players, of whom nine featured in each of the successes.

Beyond the statistics, the team also had star quality. Two of the ever-presents were a young Christy Ring and the established Jack Lynch - in the process of clocking up six successive All-Ireland medals, including the football in 1945. In the twilight of a legendary career was John Quirke, whose peak as a player coincided with the largely barren 1930s.

If posterity is in any way dubious about the team's claims, the reluctance stems from two facts. Firstly, the quality of opposition: Dublin were the All-Ireland opponents on three occasions, and Antrim provided the opposition in 1943 after famously surprising Kilkenny in a semi-final at Corrigan Park, Belfast.

Yet Dublin at that stage were a force in hurling and had won the 1938 All-Ireland. The county hadn't at that stage decided to concentrate on native players and picked hurlers from all around the country at a time when travel restrictions would have helped significantly strengthen the county team.

Dublin's performances in the All-Irelands of 1941-42 and '44 may have been a disappointment, but the county had credibly won the Leinster championship in each of the seasons, beating Kilkenny twice and Wexford once.

The second cavil is that because of a foot-and-mouth epidemic, Cork took the 1941 All-Ireland without winning Munster and went on to be defeated by Tipperary in the delayed provincial final in November. A certain amount of doubt has been cast on the seriousness of Cork's preparations and Tipp weren't to beat their neighbours again for another four championships.

Con Murphy played in the defence for the latter three All-Ireland wins and was to become president of the GAA some 30 years later. Only a teenager when he came into the team, he remembers the victories in a matter-of-fact way.

"My memory of the four-in-a-row is just of winning every year. We didn't know what we were doing in terms of the history of it. There was very little change to the teams and that was a factor in the consistency of our success.

"Limerick were our main opponents in Munster, and over the years our hardest matches were in Munster. The four-in-a-row finals were a bit of an anti-climax. In 1942, for me and the younger players we needed to keep our feet on the ground because it was our first All-Ireland, but Dublin didn't come up to expectations after coming out of Leinster and Antrim didn't do themselves justice in 1943."

In an era when the ball did most of the work, Cork hurled with abandon. The objective was simply to get to the ball first and drive it as far away from the goal as possible. The attack was a mixture of young, pacy players and older, more physical hurlers.

John Quirke, a wonderful centre back in his prime, was deployed in the full forward line. Mick Kenefick and Sean Condon were, like Murphy, teenagers when introduced in 1942. They captained Cork in 1943 and '44. Kenefick was 19 and the youngest player to receive the Liam McCarthy Cup. A broken hand which never properly healed ended his career before he even got into his 20s.

"Cork then had some of the fastest players on two feet up front," according to Murphy, "like Sean Condon. And Ring was a law unto himself. The best-known players were Jack Lynch and Christy Ring in midfield and attack but there were great players in defence as well, hurlers like Din Joe Buckley and Alan Lotty."

Ring didn't arrive centre-stage until the 1946 final, when his first-half goal turned the match and his second-half display buried Kilkenny. He was "a very good player on a very good team" but not a match-winner during the four-in-a-row. Jack Lynch was, however, at his peak, even if recognition was to shrink in the shadow of Ring's burgeoning reputation.

"Jack was a bit overshadowed," says Murphy, "and I don't think he ever got the credit for being the great hurler that he was. As a player when he was in his prime - from 1940 to say '48 - I never saw him beaten by his man whether he was playing in the forwards or at centre-field or at wing back.

"Jack was also the last captain I knew who took charge on the field. He'd give you a telling-off if you were falling down on the job, or he'd tell you, `Go over there for five minutes' and make a switch."

It was later that Con Murphy became fully acquainted with Ring's genius. Refereeing club matches, he saw his county colleagues from a different perspective. "Ring had this range of skills and his reading of the game was extraordinary."

In a county championship match, Ring and other players converged under a ball plummeting into the square. For no apparent reason, he stopped and hurried back out the field. "He ran into me on his way back," recalls Murphy who was refereeing.

"He had an instinct for the ball and, sure enough, it just dropped into his hand as he waited on his own. He took his score and said to me, `What do you think of that, Murphy?' "

On another occasion, Murphy penalised Ring for a wild pull. "Jaysus, I pulled on the ball," came the protest. "Christy, if you pulled on the ball, you'd have hit it," was the official admonition.

Ring was the only survivor of the great 1940s team to play on the three-in-a-row team of 195254. By the early 1950s, everyone else had retired - even the teenage debutantes of less than 10 years previously.

"We were quite young," says Murphy, "but we'd an awful lot done. And with the travel restrictions of the early days (caused by war-time rationing), things were a lot harder."

Hardship, however, brought its own rewards.

1941 (Cork 5-11 Dublin 0-6) - J Buttimer; W Murphy, B Thornhill, A Lotty; W Campbell, C Cottrill, DJ Buckley; S Barrett, J Lynch; C Ring, C Buckley (capt), J Young; J Quirke, T O'Sullivan, M Brennan.

1942 (Cork 2-14 Dublin 3-4) - N Porter; W Murphy, B Thornhill, C Murphy; A Lotty, DJ Buckley, J Young; J Lynch (capt), P O'Donovan; C Ring, S Condon, M Kenefick; C Tobin, J Quirke, D Beckett. Subs: J Buttimer for Porter.

1943 (Cork 5-16 Antrim 0-4) - T Mulcahy; W Murphy, B Thornhill, C Murphy; A Lotty, DJ Buckley, J Young; J Lynch, C Cottrell; S Condon, C Ring, M Kenefick (capt); J Quirke, T O'Sullivan, M Brennan. Subs: P O'Donovan for Condon; B Murphy for O'Sullivan.

1944 (Cork 2-13 Dublin 1-2) - T Mulcahy; W Murphy, B Thornhill, DJ Buckley; P O'Donovan, C Murphy, A Lotty; J Lynch, C Cottrell; C Ring, S Condon (capt), J Young; J Quirke, J Morrison, J Kelly. Subs: P Healy for C Murphy.