Kennedy upbeat after Rebel clean sheet

IT’S easy to lavish marquee forwards with praise, and they certainly deserve to have their name in lights, but just as integral to the wider operation are the players who help keep the door shut at the back.

Since Tyrone were demolished by Dublin on the last day of the league, conceding five goals in a dead rubber encounter, they have only conceded two goals in more than six hours of football.

In their Ulster Championship opener against Cavan, they were rocked by two goals conceded, probably not coincidentally, when defensive linchpin Padraig Hampsey was temporarily out of commision due to a black card.

Since then, they have gone four games on the spin without conceding a goal, a formline akin to their All-Ireland winning run in 2021 when they only conceded one goal in their entire campaign.

Vice-captain Brian Kennedy says it’s a testament to the hard work and diligence of their men at the back, who played a massive role in Tyrone’s 1-18 to 0-17 victory over Cork in their third and final group stage clash against Cork on Saturday afternoon.

“You’ll probably put the blink on us now, but it’s good to see. You’ve Niall Morgan in nets, Mattie Donnelly back there, big Paudie Hampsey, all those defenders. They’re teak-tough so it’s no surprise, when those boys are on their game they’re very hard to get around. So that’s something we’re very happy with, that we haven’t conceded any goals in those last few matches.”

Another stat that emerged from Saturday’s game was that it was the first time Tyrone have secured successive wins since the tail-end of their 2023 Division One campaign. Moreover, it’s the first time since they brought home the Sam Maguire in 2021 that they’ve managed to do so in championship football. Tyrone seem to be finding consistency at the right time and it bodes well for their chances of an elongated championship run that they claimed victory over a coming Cork side with a little bit to spare.

“It was our first back-to-back championship win in a few years as well, which is very important to us, to get that bit of consistency that we were looking. Cork are a big physical team, it was a tough game like we expected.

“They’re full of running and it took us 40 or 45 minutes to put our own stamp on the game. Their black card was definitely a help and we were sort of in the driving seat. Big Conn got sent off and we saw it out from there.”

Unfortunately, the way it all worked out, top spot eluded the Red Hands as Donegal ran up a cricket score against Clare on Saturday. It means that Tyrone face a gruelling run to the business end of the championship as they’ll need to win three games in as many weeks if they’re to reach the last four.

In the best-case scenario, Tyrone would have avoided the All-Ireland Preliminary Round quarter-finals altogether but it is what it is and Kennedy is hopeful that they
have enough conditioning in the bank to deal with their hectic schedule.

“Just getting wins is what’s important. Finishing top would have been nice but look, it wasn’t meant to be, we’ll get another game next week under our belts and hopefully we can do the business again.”

On taking the side-route to the last-eight, he said: “We did that last year as well and it sort of took the toll on the body a bit but we’ve the right boys in there in terms of strength and conditioning and hopefully we can tailor it properly to get into these games as fit as possible.”