What condition was Dublin in at the end of the Cromwell era?

At the end of the Cromwell era, Dublin was in a state of significant disrepair and decline. The city’s population had dwindled to only 9,000 inhabitants. Its physical infrastructure was severely dilapidated: the turreted city wall and its eight gates were described as a shambles, the two cathedrals were tottering, and the castle was in such poor condition that Oliver Cromwell himself referred to it as the worst in Christendom.1