That's a pretty fair summary of Cork's struggles in the opening twenty-five minutes. Clare targeted Cork's playing out from the back and had a lot of success. The Cork forwards struggled to make the ball stick, either from puck-outs or general play, so Cork lacked an outball and had very few scoring opportunities in that period - Buckley was the only Cork forward to consistently pose a threat while it was fifteen-a-side. Leahy is a wonderful player when receiving good ball, but as seen in the two previous U20 campaigns he can struggle when the ball into him is messy. His radar was wonky early on too, but TBF he settled himself down later on.
I hope O'Connor and the team learn the hard lessons from that opening period. First, when playing out from the back Cork need to move the ball more quickly from player to player, which means not only avoiding the extra touch but having players making runs to take medium-length stick passes, further forward or on the far side of the pitch. Too often Cork players were looking to offload to support runners very close by, or trying to run through two or more Clare players, condensing the play in a way which suited Clare perfectly.
Second, the balance in the forwards was off. I would have preferred O'Leary inside, as he offers something different to Leahy or Ross O'Sullivan in terms of an aerial threat and directness in possession. Likewise I would have preferred Nyhan at least on the bench if not starting, again to give an option to go long which Cork lacked last night. Or start Adam O'Sullivan inside, where he could use his pace to stretch the defence with runs out from the box to the corners - it's not his usual position but Cork need to have a curveball or two to throw at teams who know pretty much what to expect from them.
I also think Cork lack a physical edge to their game which they had last year. This is hardly surprising, since most of the physically imposing players in last year's team (Downey, Cunningham, and O'Connor and Walsh in some matches) have moved on. They don't need to go looking for direct replacements, but they need to think about how the team as a whole can play more aggressively in specific areas of the pitch. Clare aren't a massive team but they out-worked and out-muscled Cork for significant periods last night. That's not just down to individual players working hard - they were organised in how and where they hunted down the Cork players in possession, and looked to close off the short passing options. Cork need to approach every game with a similar attitude and organisation.
