Cork's drive for five likely to pay dividends

WOMEN'S FOOTBALL ALL_IRELAND SENIOR CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL: Cork v Dublin:TIME FLIES and it hardly seems like five years since Dublin were last in the TG4 All-Ireland women's football final. That team excited high hopes the title might at last be on its way to the capital. But the devastating, dying-seconds defeat by Mayo in 2003 seemed to sap the team's spirit and a year later as favourites they were overrun by Galway.

Since then the football landscape has been dominated by the remarkable Cork team that tomorrow chases its fifth successive title. Their biggest tussle came against the least experienced opponents, Armagh, in 2006. Although Dublin have changed in the past few years, there is still a strong presence of players who have experienced the big day in Croke Park.

Their performances have been impressively resilient, resisting Kerry in the quarter-final and coming from behind in the semi-final against Monaghan.

Cork have incorporated three new players into the side from last year, Rena Buckley, Ciara O’Sullivan, and corner forward Rhona Buckley. The win over Mayo in the semi-final was accomplished and if the strengths are familiar, Norita Kelly and Juliet O’Connor at centrefield and the fast, penetrative breaks of Briege Corkery from wing back, the team looks far from jaded.

Dublin’s stand-out performer in their semi-final was full forward Sinéad Aherne, who hit 1-9, but she was well supported by wing back Siobhán McGrath and corner forward Lyndsey Peat, currently joint-captain of the Ireland basketball team.

Although Dublin have recorded rare wins over Cork, their re-emergence after a couple of bad years has left the bookies unimpressed with the champions quoted at 1 to 11 and Dublin available at 6 to 1.

It should be closer than those odds suggest but Cork’s drive for five is still likely to be successful.

CORK: E Harte; Rena Buckley, A Walsh, G O'Flynn; B Corkery, B Stack, C O'Sullivan; J Murphy, N Kelly; N Cleary, D O'Reilly, A O'Shea; M O'Connor (captain), V Mulcahy, Rhona Buckley.

DUBLIN: C O'Connor; A Cluxton, N Comyn, M Kavanagh; C Barrett, S Furlong, S McGrath; D Masterson (captain), N McEvoy; M Nevin, A McGuinness, K Flood; L Davey, S Aherne, L Peat.

Referee: D Corcoran (Mayo).