Clare have their underage structures in fine condition. Their minor team of 2023 was brilliant and theyâve been very competitive at u20/17 the last few years. They havd excellent schools structures too. They are not going anywhere.
Galway have bundles of hurlers but are probably still a bit hamstrung out West, it wonât take much for them to get back to being a top 4 side but theyâll probably always be that flakiness.
I would worry about Waterford who havenât had a good minor team in a decade now at this stage, they donât have a large player pool and are financially weak. Demographics are not helping either with ballygunnar having a monopoly of resources in the East and many other smaller clubs around mid and west Waterford struggling for numbers.
Cork have went 2 decades without an all Ireland and thereâs no reason KK or Tipp wonât do the same if they donât cop on.
Tipp have had two excellent minor teams in the past three years while Clare have had two good ones and one excellent one, with a very strong crop coming again next year.
While Tipp may go on and dominate and win multiple all Irelands in the future and Clare are soon to say goodbye to the 3 in a row 21s group, but I think it is odd that someone would argue that Tipp will dominate and Clare completely fall away - Clare have a very solid group of core players to build their next side off aged between 20 and 24 which Tipp donât have currently. Mightnât lead to anything but Hogan, Diarmuid Ryan, Rodgers et al are marquee lads you can build a team around and there is serious talent in the county aged between 16 and 19.
Thatâs great but Kelly, OâDonnell, Conlon, McInerney and Duggan will all be gone soon and you donât simply replace that. David Fitzgerald isnât going to get any better than he is now.
Even as it is theyâre sort of struggling to keep pace with the real top counties based on squad depth and have done exceedingly well to be there or thereabouts three years in a row. Theyâre maxing out, as people who speak newspeak say. They have one shot at the big prize on Sunday.
Clare this year against Tipp and Waterford in championship had
Adam Hogan - 21
Conor Leen - 22
Diarmuid Ryan - 25
Cian Galvin - 22
Darragh Lohan - 24
Starting between 2 and 8 it is a decent starting point for the second half of the decade - they will need to blood and find a number of players over the next two or three years but they are there - Sean Rynne, John Conneally, Keith Smyth, Jack OâNeill to name a few all have the size and hurling needed and will get the opportunities shortly - that is before the 2023 minors come on stream and they are a deep group of athletic hurlers.
Ya I wouldnât know much about these Clare young lads tbh but it will be incredibly tough to replace the likes of sod, Tony Kelly, Duggan and the likes.
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These fellas donât grow on trees. They are generational talents. Tyrone have had plenty of minor and 21 success but they have never produced the calibre of players they had from 03 to 08.
Then getting the management ticket right too as well.
I think John kiely was offered the job in 2013 after John Allen and turned it down. It is often about timing.
Iâd be surprised if we are close to winning all Irelands in 2026 to 2028 but there wont be a drop off like there was after the 95/97 group walked away in the mid 2000s. They will be at worst a solid side - like you say getting the next management and coaching ticket right will determine where they get to come the end of the decade when the 23/24/25 minors are up to speed
Yes you can, thereâs no reason why some of that exceptional minor team cannot be future greats.
Tony Kelly is probably the only player you could say is goat territory and why canât someone like Jack o neill, eoghan gunning or mark o brien be that next Goat?
Look you talking about underage hurling teams is a bit like me talking about maiden hurdlers, off that Tipp minor team Darragh McCarthy will play next year and is exceptional.
Euan Murray is the best minor since Noel McGrath.
Thereâs others like Sam O Farrell, Aaron O Halloran and Adam Daly who definitely have it.
I think thereâs about 30 players in the 18-21 category that have the potential, I do doubt whether our county board can financially bolster to cultivate these lads in the same way Limerick did.
You can, if the players coming in are great players, but how likely is it? Tipp havenât just replaced Podrick and Brendan Maher, Callanan and Bubbles despite winning two u-21/u-20 titles in a row.
Younger players have found it harder to step up since the age grade changes, very little in the way of stand out young players around in recent years in the senior championships.
It probably goes in fits and bursts but that minor/21 team was up there with the greatest of all time.
Of those successful Tipperary teams the most outstanding players were Jerome Cahill who didnât commit, Ger Browne hasnât pushed on, Dillon Quirke RIP and the verdict is still out on Jake Morris who I think can be great and Mark Kehoe who is running out of road.
Tipperary probably won a lot of those games due to excellent coaching of Cahill/Bevans.
Tipperary will always be strong underage as they have snipers in cooper helmets who will invariably clean off some of the ducks in other counties.
Iâm not saying anything about the current minors. Iâm saying itâs very hard to create a team from scratch. It doesnât really matter how good the younger lads are. You completely missed the point.
It was said that Tipp donât have an older group to build around. Depending on whether Tipp can get a good group of young players coming through over the next few years, a group of older players such as Craig Morgan, Ronan Maher, Paddy Cadell, Jake Morris and maybe two or three others is surely what you build around.
The notion that Limerick would have been building a young team around the likes of Graeme Mulcahy would have been considered ludicrous seven or eight years back and yet he was a very important pillar of their success. Like, how bad were Limerick in 2015 and 2016? They were terrible.
Younger players coming through can bring the best out of older fellas who havenât done much in their careers so far.
Iâm really not sure about that Tipp management team though, Cahillâs stock is seriously falling.
