Tom Humphriesstruggles to get two canny managers to offer hostages to fortune

KILLARNEY’S NEW dressingroom complex curves and buzzes like the interior of a beehive after a game on a summer’s day. Conor Counihan tries to take advantage of the rattle and hum and slip away quietly. He is descended upon by the worker bees of the media who must carry quotes or they will die.

What might have been? “We had a couple of goal chances around the hour, yeah, if we had got either of them it would have made a difference, bridged a gap. We have to battle on, we’ll just drive on in Cork.”

And in the post mortem? Will there be more good than bad? “Well, how much was pleasing? There were a whole pile of pleasing things. From one to 20 everybody gave 100 per cent. It was a tough battle, as you’d expect. We would be pleased overall. Disappointed with some of the misses but pleased.”

In the event of a draw nobody really cares if the worker bees don’t get the choicest pollen when it comes to quotes. Nobody wants to say anything is the rule.

Conor confirmed the young lads did well, the injured lads will be looked at and Kerry remain the favourites.

Are ye favourites? “What are ye gonna make us!” he says laughing hugely “Can I call that one and ye’ll just follow? Kerry are definitely favourites!”

We all laugh. Somebody tries to slip in a tricky one while we are having fun . . .

Are Kerry slightly over the top? “If they are over the top and we are drawing with them it says something about us, too. No, there are two good football teams out there. It will go to the next day. Kerry finished stronger; they came back into the game, they were chasing it and we seemed to have trouble getting hold of the ball which was disappointing. They got a big of momentum. That happens.”

Bah. Couldn’t be up to them. Jack O’Connor’s first words as a baby were “yerra, what do ye think?” so the chances of him leaking like a BP oil well right now are remote. We land on him anyway. Just in case.

“We’re happy enough to be able to get a draw but disappointed the game didn’t go on another couple of minutes. I thought there was that much in it.”

We gather in close. On the day this is what passes for white hot controversy. He moves on however, perhaps disturbed by us all gathering in close.

“I thought at some times on the day we got no breaks in any shape or form. We tackled and turned over ball and it seemed to just fall into other fellas’ hands. They were quicker and sharper around the middle third of the field. That was the key thing.

“When we got a ball up we were dangerous. Obviously Paul (Galvin) coming on we were dangerous the last 15 minutes picking up a few more breaks. We’re happy to get a draw but a bit disappointed too.”

He had to take off his two midfielders in the first major championship game post-Darragh. We’ll make something big out of this if he permits us to.

“Well, Mike picked up a bad belt to the eye and his vision was impaired. He has a fine shiner inside in the dressingroom so that necessitated a change at half-time. We weren’t at full pelt. Young Walsh had a big influence for a while for Cork. So we had to move.” No drama.

Did Jack feel Kerry were further along yesterday than when they drew with Cork a year ago? “I’m not sure we are further on. Ye can judge that. It is a very good Cork team. No bones about it.

“The game will bring both teams on. I just felt on the day just nothing was going right. We gave away a couple of awful scores in the second half. Easy points to hand up. We were fighting an uphill battle after that. We battled away. People who thought there was no battle left in this team were mistaken. There is. There is.”

Will Galvin ride out for the replay? “Ah, I don’t know. He picked up tonsillitis during the week so hadn’t togged out in any shape or form for 17 days or so. Hoping he would be able to train with his ankle but he couldn’t. We were lucky to get the 15 minutes or so.”

He spoke of Bryan Sheehan delivering on his immense potential, of Tomás Ó Sé as if there were anything left to say and referred obliquely to the lack of ball to the full-forward line which forced Kieran Donaghy to go scavenging.

Paul Kerrigan, another who had a good day only to see it disappear into the statistical netherworld of a draw, was pleased enough.

“We had three debutants out there. They have their first championship game under the belt and looking forward to next week already. We wanted to try to kill off these fellas as best we could but they hung in there and hung in. That’s what champions do. They got their reward. I’m disappointed we didn’t finish off.”