Iâm travelling with more hope than last year but hard to see Kilkenny win this.
In the last three matches weâve been beaten by Wexford, depended on a freak goal to beat Galway after throwing away a big lead, and were let back Into the Clare game by a puck out calamity, again having lost a decent lead.
If Limerick hurl at a decent level, theyâll win easy but they have been threatening a terrible performance all year.
Blanchfield is a big loss, esp against the Limerick half forwards. Interesting to see if theyâll start Buckley, if heâs not too distracted.
Weâll need to be out of the blocks sharpish enough, Mullen to be somewhere near his best and hope Keenan doesnât forget his whistle.
This is it - the form simply isnât in the book with Kilkenny.
Now they arenât Galway and wonât roll over but the narrative they are better than last year is bizarre. Conor Browne and Mikey Carey are losses and Cian Kenny despite making an impact the last day from the bench was in better form last year than this year.
That last part is very true. Without 8 or 9 TJ Reid frees then itâs difficult to see Kilkenny posting a tally large enough to take down this Limerick team. The likes of Tom Phelan and John Donnelly are good hurlers and very selfless but they wonât contribute much on the scoreboard youâd imagine. What I like about Mossy Keoghan is his nose for goal. He regularly comes up trumps in that regard. If I was a Kilkenny man Iâd like to see Adrian Mullen closer to goals. Having him out in midfield reminds me of Galwayâs deployment of Cathal Mannion at 9.
Ah, a prophet in his own land etc, heâs clearly been 1 of the driving forces in Kildanganâs meteoric rise from middling intermediate team to senior county champions. But as someone who spends quite a bit of time in the parish, a sizeable hurling contingent, plus the usual on the ditch merchants, nearly canât stand him anymore. They had a good league under new manager John OâMeara (Clare?) but the restless natives are muttering that BDE will swan back and take it over and balls it up again (ref they lost a county final replay to a really average Kilruane outfit). Theyâve short memories, them nouveau riche crowd. Imho BDE needs to cop himself on on the sideline and stfu to referees
@Malarkey will know more but I think Mullen can be shut down relatively easily when inside. The 2019 Senior Final and 2017 AI Minor Semi Final (Darren Morrissey held him well that day) being classics of this genre. Possibly because he was/is a little one-sided although his right has improved a lot over the years.
Heâs able to be a playmaker out the field where there is more room. It would be foolish to take him out there now.
Was over the Well for the past two years; oversaw an absolute disaster of a year last year.
They just never got going. I was surprised he got a second year after 2021 tbh, where they were average enough, but losing to Liberties was a shambles.
I think Adrian Mullen is far more mature now and could do an excellent job in forwards. I imagine he will hurl most of the game at midfield and may go into the forwards for last quarter. David Blanchfieldâs injury is significant both as regards his presence and as regards where others could be deployed.
Yes, I would expect HL on AG and TW on SF. MB following PC is logical. For Kilkenny, TWâs form is a major worry.
The difficultly with MB following CL is that he would have to be picked as a de facto third midfielder. The team would need to be picked significantly differently to allow this gambit: six backs, three midfielders (including MB) and five forwards.
Similar thoughts to my own. I think youâre understating the wins against Galway and Clare though.
I do think the team is in a better position than what it was last year. Much more assured in the full back line, Tommy Walsh has improved a lot this year. The half-back line is like for like with Blanchfield being a slight upgrade if he was fit.
Cian Kenny started the match last year, heâs unlikely to this year but heâs a decent sub to bring on when the game is a bit stretched. Browne is missing from last years team but heâs a workhorse and not much of a upgrade on Fogarty, if any.
Itâs fairly like for like in the forwards, personnel wise, with most of them improving after another year under the belt, particularly Cody. TJ is another year older but I feel that heâs coming into the final in better form than this time last year.
They have struggled to put a consistent 40 minutes together all year let alone 70 minutes (neither have Limerick tbh) but theyâve finished strongly when they needed to (as have Limerick)
All that said, theyâll need Limerick to have an off day to win
Clare did that quite effectively the night of the round robin game. Itâs not so much that Limerick were forced to go long, rather than having to play it into a 50-50 contested ball.
Limerick havenât really played much short line ball all year.
It was an area they got a lot of joy from but teams have it well copped now.
Their long ones have been absolutely wretched though.
