It hasn't been the most opulent of hurling summers but the bare look was banished yesterday at Croke Park by grace of one late goal and the 70 minutes of rugged beauty which preceded it. Tom Humphries reports from Croke Park
In the end Wexford filched a draw from Cork and granted everyone the chance to go through it all again next Saturday at 3.30 p.m.
This was the year's first classic. A game nourished by a historical hurling relationship and the desire of each side to prove something to themselves this summer. Semi-final games often have that edge which pure desperation brings. It can sour a game or make it sing. This game soared crazy as a soprano on mescaline.
Having dominated from throw-in to midway through the second half, Wexford saw a six point lead turn itself into a five point deficit with just 13 minutes left. They clawed their way back and then slipped away again. Cork went to the death with a two point lead and then ran in one, two, three, no four wides before Alan Browne put them three points ahead in injury time.
And just as it looked as if a great plotline was about to peter out we got the ending we deserved. A long Wexford puck-out found Mitch Jordan on the left. Jordan looked hellbent on shooting for glory, but at the last minute he popped a handpass to Rory McCarthy, free but working with difficult angles and little time.
Not just that. Most people were surprised to see that Rory McCarthy was still on the field so complete had been his prior anonymity. McCarthy made crisp and perfect contact. The ball whiskered, the net shimmered. The final whistle blew. Wexford went jigging and reeling away in the sun - 59,435 paying customers bathed in the wonderment. This was the first mishap of Cork's summer. So far they have been clocking in early, working hard and getting home early as they bounced through the Munster championship. Yesterday the optimists felt they might do something ugly to Wexford and the pessimists felt that their dispatch would at least be efficient.
Wexford are having an elastic season. Written off in many quarters early on, they duly lost to Kilkenny and were expected then to be killed off by Waterford. They survived and limped past Antrim. Nobody is saying they can win it. Three months ago nobody was saying they could get this far. "People have written us off all summer," said their manager John Conran when it was all over.
"Do you think they'll be doing that after today's performance?" he was asked. "Sure hope so," he said. And he turned back towards his players whose relieved whooping had yet to subside.