HE had seen his players haul themselves back from the brink in their two previous assignments, but team coach Brian Cuthbert admitted he had serious doubts that Cork would be capable of producing another Houdini-act at Croke Park last Sunday.

"We have been trying to drill it into them all year not to panic, but we were nine points down with fifteen minutes to go, and I said to the selectors if we can pull this one out of the fire, we are going to be very lucky. In fairness to the lads, they seem to have taken the advice we have given them on board, and they just kept plugging away.

"The way they came back, not by scoring a massive amount of goals, but by picking off point after point, showed great maturity. Even some of the scores we got were very difficult, and we are absolutely delighted with the win, because after 13 minutes of the second half it would have been very easy to fold up tent and go home feeling we had a good year.

"There can be no disputing now that we have a bunch of players who will always battle to the end, but after the Galway 'keeper brought off a great save from John O'Rourke, we were still five points down with about ten minutes remaining, and I felt the game might be gone from us today," he revealed.

Cuthbert agreed that Cork's performance wasn't without its flaws defensively, pointing out that Galway might have had four or five goals during a potentially disastrous spell in the third quarter. "We coughed up one or two very soft goals as it was, but when you come to Croke Park with 18-year olds, you are never going to get 15 or 20 of them playing at their best.

"We had to rectify a few small things near the end, but, with the type of game we play, you are always need to bring on a few fellas. We have a very even spread of players, so we know we can call upon any of the 24 members of the panel, and that they would be able to do a job for us. We have plenty to work on for the final, and if we go behind against Tyrone, maybe to come back and win a championship match isn't going to happen for us for a fourth time on the trot," he warned.

While stressing that there are no 'super-stars' in the team, Cuthbert acknowledged that there were a few outstanding individual displays produced last Sunday. "I thought Damien (Cahalane) had a brilliant game, he was the one guy that kept driving us forward, and our comeback stemmed largely from the dominance we enjoyed at midfield during the last quarter.

"We really cleaned Galway out in this area where Jamie (Burns) also played his part, but Damien's performance was remarkable, all the more so considering he's after playing five championship games at club level over the past 13 days, and he was suffering from a stomach bug last week.

"Brian (Hurley) got some crucial scores for us again, but he's one of those special players who relishes the big occasion, and he's obviously going to be marked man in the final against Tyrone, who have some very good defenders. Jamie ( Wall) was taken off at half time in the quarter final against Armagh, so he decided that this was going to be his day, and, in fairness, he had a very good game at wing-back.

"Not for the first time this season, we were well served by the bench, and Conor O'Sullivan was very effective going forward after he came on for the last 20 minutes."

Cuthbert felt Cork were the better team overall, and that they created enough opportunities to have finished the first half in front. "While we could have scored two or three more goals in the first half, maybe we should have popped the ball over the bar when we had the chances. If we had done that, we might have gone in leading at half time instead of being a goal behind, and it's possible we could have been spared all the anxiety we had to endure in the second half," he suggested.

- Noel Horgan