Save us all some hassle and give the Frank Fox Cup to Corofin now

Inside Track with John McIntyre

EIGHT matches were played in the Galway senior football championship over the weekend, but you’d nearly be inclined to ask what’s the point? Title holders Corofin weren’t in action, but their long shadow hangs over all the other contenders such is their ongoing superiority at local senior level.

Corofin have been Galway’s dominant force of the modern era, but never has there been such a gulf between them and the pursuing pack as there is now. Chasing a six-in-a-row of county championships, unless Kevin O’Brien’s charges suffer a meltdown of epic proportions in a knock-out match, they are certain to maintain their iron-like grip on the Frank Fox Cup this Winter.

Though reaching such a milestone is testimony to the consistent high standards being reached and sustained by Corofin, their stranglehold on the championship must be demoralising for all their rivals. Reflecting on their magnificent display in thrashing Nemo Rangers at Croke Park last March, Ciaran McGrath and company would have even beaten a few county teams that day such was their overall quality.

Those looking for chinks in Corofin’s armour will point to their narrow escape against Moorefield of Kildare in the All-Ireland semi-final last February, but in a terrible miscarriage of justice they had Michael Farragher dismissed not long after the throw-in. The bottom line is that their 14-men managed to tough it out which shows that the innate quality in Corofin’s ranks is augmented by the necessary mettle.

Though the club is blessed with an extraordinary number of talented footballers, their preparations are probably at a different level too. They arguably train more professionally than anyone else and though surviving a mighty scare from Annaghadown in last year’s semi-final, the bottom line is that the title holders were still able to pull the match out of the fire despite being below their best.

Against that background, it appears incredulous that Corofin only had two players – attacker Ian Burke and substitute defender Kieran Molloy – on the Galway match-day 26 against Dublin in the recent All-Ireland semi-final, but that only means there is less disruption to their own training programme than one would have assumed for a team streets-ahead of nearly all their local counterparts.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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