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NEW THREE? Ciar\u00e1n Joyce of Cork. Photo by Ray McManus\/Sportsfile<\/p>\nIn his final Irish Examiner column of 2024, Se\u00e1nie McGrath wrote of his firm belief that at least two positions in the Cork defence were up for grabs going into the 2025 season.<\/p>\n
No change in the Cork defence ever came. Nobody from the wings was successful in usurping O\u2019Leary, O\u2019Donoghue, Joyce, Coleman, or the Downey brothers.<\/p>\n
Cork\u2019s back six for the 2025 All-Ireland final defeat to Tipperary, save for a positional switch between Ciar\u00e1n Joyce and Rob Downey in the half-back line, was the exact same as the red rearguard from the unsuccessful bid 12 months earlier.<\/p>\n
The conversation heading into 2026 was largely unchanged from what Se\u00e1nie had written 12 months earlier. There was a No.3 shirt up for grabs. No columnist, pundit, or punter disagreed on that point.<\/p>\n
D\u00e1ire O\u2019Leary was auditioned in said No.3 shirt across Cork\u2019s opening five games of the League. For the first four, the Watergrasshill clubman acquitted himself fine, albeit the debate around the position went unsettled.<\/p>\n
The debate was fully reopened following O\u2019Leary\u2019s difficult evening in the company of Limerick\u2019s Shane O\u2019Brien. There was no sixth game audition.<\/p>\n
It was Ciar\u00e1n Joyce who got handed the full-back shirt for the subsequent Offaly visit. The expectation – and we could of course be way off here – is that Joyce will hold onto the jersey for Sunday\u2019s League final and beyond.<\/p>\n
What all that means is Cork would be headed into a third consecutive championship with the same back six. The latest search for Liam MacCarthy, save for a positional switch between Joyce and Eoin Downey, would be unchanged from the two previous failed bids.<\/p>\n
With Joyce in mind, we asked manager Ben O\u2019Connor at last week\u2019s League final media night if he\u2019d have an issue playing someone in such a specialised position, come championship, who spent so very little time there during the spring.<\/p>\n
NEW THREE? Ciar\u00e1n Joyce of Cork. Photo by Ray McManus\/Sportsfile<\/p>\n
And bear in mind also that Joyce, prior to the Offaly game on March 21, had started 42 games across League and Championship for Cork but never once occupied the full-back berth. Indeed, across those 42 games, he had only once started in the full-back line, that the 2022 League final defeat to Waterford when he operated at corner-back.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s actually played at midfield in red on more occasions than he\u2019s been found in the last line of defence.<\/p>\n
None of that, of course, is to say he won\u2019t thrive in the No.3 shirt, if persisted with. It is just to make the point that he\u2019s an absolute novice in this position.<\/p>\n
\u201cIs there any such thing as a full-back any more?\u201d asks Ben in reply.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne time, you had two corner-backs, a full-back, and that was it. Now, most teams play with two inside.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne time, the slowest fella on the field was probably your full-back. Him or a corner-forward that had good hands. Normally, a big, strong fella would be put in full-back. Now, you have to be able to hurl and you have to be able to move.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Eoin Downey held down the role for the past two years. He finished 2024 as All-Star full-back. His finish to 2025 was in stark contrast. Downey has spent the entire spring in the half-back line, turning in really impressive performances against Tipp and Limerick.<\/p>\n
And yet the Cork manager is adamant that Downey\u2019s residence at full-back is not a closed book.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh no, every fella is an option. He hasn’t played there this year because we know what we have there, so we’ve played him on the wing and at centre-back just to see what options we have. But Eoin has played full-back numerous times at training.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoycey was full-back against Offaly and that’s just trying him out there. He was an All-Star wing-back last year and he went inside. We just want options for as many positions as possible.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have Eoin Downey, Joycey, Rob, and they can all play in the full-back line. Niall O’Leary and Se\u00e1nie O’Donoghue, was it two or three years ago the two of them played centre-forward for their clubs? They’re two of the best corner-backs in the country and they were playing centre-forward for their clubs. We have good hurlers and they’re versatile. Fellas have to be able to perform in different positions.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Friday\u2019s team announcement will be interesting beyond the identity of Cork\u2019s full-back. Further up, will there be inclusion for Barry Walsh after back-to-back Wednesdays of shooting 0-14 and 2-9 for the U20s?<\/p>\n
There has been no surprise, for Ben anyway, as to the instant impact of the Killeagh teenager at senior level.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone who thought he was coming in just to get a… if they saw the size of him. He’s a 19-year-old in a 25-year-old’s body. The boys have racks for weights and he was put on rack one straightaway when he came in. That’s the heavy stuff that the big boys are lifting. We’re looking at this year [with Barry], not the year after or the year after that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Following their win over Galway, Limerick manager John Kiely said he expected to face two different Cork teams in Sunday\u2019s League final and the championship instalment at P\u00e1irc U\u00ed Chaoimh three weeks later.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’ll be putting out our strongest team for the League final. Three weeks after that, we’ll be putting out our strongest team for that as well. We’re going out to win all games in front of us,\u201d was Ben\u2019s latest reply when Kiely\u2019s comments were put to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re not shadow-boxing anyway, and I’m sure Limerick won’t be either. We’re going down to put ourselves up against the best and see how we get on.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In his final Irish Examiner column of 2024, Se\u00e1nie McGrath wrote of his firm belief that at least…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":380158,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2110,1964,61,60,112],"class_list":["post-380157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-cork-sport","tag-cork-gaa","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=380157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/380158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=380157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=380157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=380157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}