Second-half goals from Colm O'Neill and Ian Maguire propelled Cork to a 2-9 to 1-6 victory over Longford at Pearse Park.

Trailing by four at the break, the Munster giants were in all sorts of trouble but their second-half replacements - most noticeably O'Neill and Patrick Kelly - got them out of jail to secure a Round Four Qualifier date in a fortnight with the losers of either the Leinster or Ulster final.

The winners, who went nearly half an hour without a score, finished a very competitive encounter with 14 men, while Longford - who stunned Monaghan last weekend - had two men sent off.

The Leesiders had points from James Loughrey, Paul Kerrigan and Michael Hurley - a late addition to the starting XV - inside the first ten minutes but failed to register again in the first half as the midlanders established a 1-4 to 0-3 interval lead, with 3,567 looking on.

Hurley's point made it 0-3 to 0-1 with Robbie Smyth having opened the scoring for the hosts, and Smyth's second (free) followed by a Diarmuid Masterson score had the Leinster county level by the midway stage in the first half. Smyth had the ball in the net but play was called back for a Longford penalty, which Brian Kavanagh fired calmly to the net, sending Ryan Price the wrong way to make it double scores with ten minutes left in the first half. James McGivney closed the first-half scoring.

Mark Collins and O'Neill (free) hit the first two scores after the restart in the 39^th and 42^nd minutes respectively before Collins and game-changer Kelly pointed either side of O'Neill's 49th-minute goal to assure the Leesiders of a three-point lead with 20 minutes left, 1-7 to 1-4.

As tempers became frayed, Cork's Loughrey and Longford's Darren Gallagher were both shown red cards and Longford's first score of the second half didn't arrive until the 55^th minute when Kavanagh smashed one over from distance.

On the hour, midfielder Maguire gathered a pass from Kelly and rounded impressive Longford goalie Paddy Collum to net from close range and leave five points between the teams, 2-7 to 1-5. Michael Quinn and Kerrigan (free) swapped points and the hosts' chances went up in smoke completely when they were reduced to 13 men in the 69^th minute as Masterson picked up his second yellow card and therefore a red.

John O'Rourke was happy enough to take his point at the death as the Rebels evetually coasted into the last twelve after a bit of a fright.

Cork - R Price; C O'Driscoll, E Cadagon, N Galvin; B O'Driscoll, J Loughrey (0-1), T Clancy; A O'Connor, I Maguire (1-0); M Collins (0-2), K O'Driscoll, P Kerrigan (0-2, 1f); D Goulding, P Kelleher, M Hurley (0-1). Subs: S Powter for B O'Driscoll, P Kelly (0-1) for D Goulding, C O'Neill (1-1, 0-1f) for K O'Driscoll, J O'Rourke (0-1) for P Kelleher, R Deane for A O'Connor, S Cronin for C O'Neill (BC).

Longford - P Collum; D McElligott, B Gilleran, B O'Farrell; C Farrelly, M Quinn (0-1sl), B McKeon; M Brady, D Gallagher; D Masterson (0-1), J McGivney (0-1), D Brady; R Smyth (0-2, 1f), B Kavanagh (1-1, 1-0pen), L Connerton. Subs: M Hughes for M Brady, P McGee for B McKeon, D Reynolds for L Connerton, B Farrell for B Kavanagh, R Connor for C Farrelly.

Referee - B Cassidy.

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