{"id":466162,"date":"2026-05-25T12:30:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T12:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/466162\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T12:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T12:30:18","slug":"defence-from-the-front-giving-cork-hurlers-solidity-but-its-the-minimal-expectation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/466162\/","title":{"rendered":"Defence from the front giving Cork hurlers solidity but it’s the minimal expectation\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Speaking to the press after Sunday\u2019s win over Clare, Cork attacker Alan Connolly was asked if scoring 11 points was more satisfying than having a few goals and a few points to his name.<\/p>\n

Rather than plumping for either, he instead cited the importance of workrate \u2013 hooks, blocks, tackles and turnovers \u2013 in providing the first line of defence.<\/p>\n

It is something that has characterised Cork\u2019s Munster campaign to date and, when asked about it, manager Ben O\u2019Connor pointed to the necessity of such efforts being a baseline expectation, given the competition for places.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have 10 or 11 fellas sitting outside who want to be in there where you are, you’ll run too,\u201d he said. \u201cThat’s the easiest thing you can do in this game, is run.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n It is a bit like watching Arsenal, pressing high up the field, and we’ll try and keep the pressure off the lads at the back.\n <\/p>\n

\u201cThat’s the way we are training, that’s the way the lads are playing, and it’s just pressure from the panel that is there that the minimum required is hard work. <\/p>\n

\u201cHurling will take care of itself, but once the boys are trying hard, that is the main thing we are judging a lot of fellas on.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"CorkCork fans\u00a0Cian O\u2019Connor, Levi Gore, Kyle Mulcahy, Ois\u00edn O\u2019Sullivan and Fiadh O\u2019Sullivan raise their hurleys before the game on Sunday. Picture: Chani Anderson<\/p>\n

To that end, the 16-point win on Sunday was the exception compared to the four-point wins over Tipperary and Waterford and the two-point victory against Limerick. <\/p>\n

Cork managed \u2018only\u2019 four goals across the four games but ultimately durability and pragmatism provided enough of a bedrock to negate the need to go out and hunt goals to win shootouts.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Connor isn\u2019t against free-flowing hurling by any means but ultimately it\u2019s a results-based business and as much depends on the opposition as it does on Cork\u2019s intentions.<\/p>\n

ADAPTABLE<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, it can’t be that every day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cTeams are going out to set up against you, the same as we go out to set up against other teams so as I said two weeks ago, if we get enough points to win a game, I’m not bothered about the goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s nice to be getting the goals but still we got the one today and we’d two more chances that we maybe butchered. Once we’re winning games, we won’t worry about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

And it was one that they won in a comfortable fashion, with Cork\u2019s 14-point triumph over Clare on one side with Limerick\u2019s 15-point triumph in Ennis while the Banner had three points to spare at home to Waterford as well as beating Tipperary by 11.<\/p>\n

They will go into an All-Ireland quarter-final against the losers of the Dublin-Galway Leinster final, while Offaly will await the vanquished team in the Cork-Limerick tie.<\/p>\n

On form up to now, Cork and Limerick are the clear market leaders but, as we have seen in the not-too-distant past, much can change once the format changes to knockout hurling.<\/p>\n

For Cork, they have done what they needed in the round-robin but much bigger tests await.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Speaking to the press after Sunday\u2019s win over Clare, Cork attacker Alan Connolly was asked if scoring 11…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1965,1964,42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-466162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-hurling","tag-cork-gaa","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466162","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=466162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}