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Impressive Offaly Stand Toe To Toe With Rebels

Thursday, 17 February 2011

Brian Carroll scored four points from play in Offaly's opening league game.

Allianz Hurling League Div. 1: Cork 1-20 Offaly 1-15.

Offaly produced a strong performance on the banks of the Lee on Sunday as they left Pairc Ui Chaoimh with a five point defeat to a stronger Cork outfit. Recent years have seen heavy defeats down in Cork but the manner of this narrow defeat can leave Offaly followers with sincere hope and ambition for the year ahead.
Played in front of a sparse 1,406 patrons, the badly cut up sod proved increasingly difficult for both teams as the match wore on, compounded by the fact that the best hurling was played by both sides in the first half.
Optimism had been low around the county after a poor performance against Carlow last Saturday week, but they stood up to the plate on Sunday and were even unlucky not to be closer or even scrape a draw.
Offaly went toe to toe with Cork for large parts of the game especially in the first half going in at half time only a point in arrears on a scoreline of 1-12 to 1-11. Cork had that extra strength in depth in the second half with their substitutes kicking them on to victory.
Joe Dooley's injury list hampered his options on the substitutes bench and this told as they game wore on. All involved can be proud of the showing and will bring huge confidence in to the home game with Galway this Sunday.
James Rigney's outing at full back came to a premature end due to a hand injury but Cork full forward Paudie O'Sullivan had four points from play before Rigney had to retire. David Kenny went back to full back and the Belmont man looked more comfortable on the edge of the square.
Conor Mahon made some piercing runs from midfield and was unlucky a couple of times in the opening half not to get on the score sheet. Brian Carroll had an excellent first half hitting four points from play with Shane Dooley back to his best from placed balls. Dooley had a glorious chance of a goal with 20 minutes left but Anthony Nash made an excellent save.
Dooley who is the captain for 2011 can feel aggrieved not to have got a few more frees from referee Michael Wadding who controlled the game very sporadically and had little consistency to his whistle blowing.
Debutants Colin Egan and Brian Mulrooney acquitted themselves well and they probably couldn't have had bigger tasks on their hands. Mulrooney started corner back and had the job of marshalling Ben O'Connor while Colin Egan, who capped his debut with a goal, was paired with the half back master, John Gardiner.
Cork's Jerry O'Connor was the star of the show and his all round distribution and graft stood out. Pa Cronin was impressive at centre forward while Paudie O'Sullivan had an excellent first half.
Cork got the perfect start as Tom Kenny had the ball in the net after 45 seconds. His run through the middle ended when he spotted James Dempsey slightly off his line and his deft effort dipped over the Kinnitty custodian's head into the top corner.
To their credit, Offaly didn't drop the heads and plugged away eventually getting back level after seven minutes. Shane Kelly pointed from distance in the third minute before Shane Dooley fired over from play and from a free to leave them deadlocked at 1-0 to 0-3.
Cork powered back again and hit three unanswered points from Pat Horgan (two frees) and a simple point from centre forward Pa Cronin. Brian Carroll opened his account in the 12th minute but Offaly really turned a few heads when Colin Egan found the net after he finished off an excellent team move involving Joe Bergin, Cathal Parlon and Stephen Wynne in the 14th minute.
Both sides went point for point up until the 21st minute and the sides were level at 1-6 each. Brian Carroll fired over Offaly's brace with Ben O'Connor floating over a sideline and Paudie O'Sullivan pointing for the Rebels.
Cathal Naughton pucked over two quick fire points but a Shane Dooley free and another super Brian Carroll point levelled matters again with nine minutes left in the half.
A brace from Paudie O'Sullivan and a Pat Horgan point stretched Cork into a three point lead with half time approaching. Injury time produced four points with the Faithful County notching three of them courtesy of Stephen Wynne, a Shane Dooley free and a super solo effort from Joe Bergin to leave Cork 1-12 to 1-11 ahead at the break.
Jerry O'Connor improved as the game went on and he dominated midfield in a flawless display. He set up Pat Horgan with a superb pass to point two minutes in to the second half. He got a point of his own on 44 minutes when he fired over from distance.
Offaly were finding it hard to re-create the form of the first half but a Shane Dooley free did keep them in touch. Dooley had a great goal chance on 50 minutes when his point blank shot was saved by Cork keeper Anthony Nash. This was a major turning point in the game as Cork went down the field at took a three point lead after Ben O'Connor slotted over a free.
With fresh legs on the field, Cork started to pull away and points from Pa Cronin, Ben O'Connor (free) and from Brian Murphy cemented their lead and they held a 1-18 to 1-13 advantage with less than 10 minutes to go.
Cathal Parlon narrowed the gap to four points with a long range point but Niall McCarthy quickly cancelled that out. Ben O'Connor finished off Cork's scoring in the 63rd minute with a point from play and despite referee Michael Wadding awarding a penalty to Cork right on 70 minutes from all of 70 yards away, Stephen Egan stopped a fierce shot from Cian McCarthy and cleared the lines.
Joe Bergin fired over a late point to finish off the scoring but with four second half Offaly points together with five second half wides wasn't enough to take the points from Leeside.

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