They should cut senior championship to 12. Would be very cut throat then.
Agreed
And thereās a serious level of threat in every group. Compare that to the state of Limerickās format
The Clare Championship is broadly similar to Tippās in my view. 16 solid teams and relegation is a threat hanging over almost everyone. Lot of rural clubs with some excellent players and in some instances All Stars, just not enough of them to compete against Ballygunner.
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Clare teams have still reached three of the last four Munster club finals.
There isnāt really a hard and fast rule about whether a dominant club team will help a county team compared to a very competitive club championship with no single dominant team, but I would tend towards a generally competitive club championship with no one outstanding team usually being a better situation. Like in Tyrone. Or Clare. I think it creates more vibrancy within a county at all levels.
However I would say in the cases of Crossmaglen Rangers (in the 90s/2000s), Birr (90s), Na Piarsaigh (2010s) and maybe Scotstown (2010s) the emergence of those dominant club teams very much helped the Armagh, Offaly and Limerick and Monaghan county teams.
Yet I think it had the opposite effect with Kilcoo, Corofin and Ballygunner. Crossmaglen continuing to dominate didnāt help Armagh beyond 2006 and it took Crossmaglenās dominance being broken in Armagh to get the Armagh county team back as a real force.
Slaughtneilās emergence didnāt seem to help Derry very much at all yet Glenās did.
I think the Ballygunner thing has quite badly damaged Waterford hurling as a whole. A lot of clubs there just seem to have given up the idea of ever being able to challenge them and Ballygunner donāt produce nearly enough top inter-county players to backbone the Waterford team to a high level and Ballygunnerās āstandardsā havenāt transferred to the county set up.
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Would rather have an extra pool of 80 players getting senior championship experience tbh.
5 years ago I would agree with you but the quality of teams 11th to 20th player at senior level has increased dramatically recently. The large development squads are ticking away nicely.
The county board restructured all grades below senior in 2025 to 10 team championships which has been a big success also.
Ref has swollowed the whistle here. 1 free in ten minutes. Clare started well against the breeze
Ormond pretty much carrying the fight for Tipp here. They lead 1-6 to 7 at HT - Clare with a stiff enough breeze to come.
Against the breeze may suit tipps running game.
Ah lads
Honestly, deserved I think. Tipp were haunted to be 7 points up there in the second.
Clare had chances in the ten minute after half time but didnāt take them, 2 goal chances and hit the post twice. Got it back to 1 but then hit a flat spot and forwards didnāt win a ball for 10 minutes and Tipp got a goal to push it out to 6 and and looked to have won it. Tipp Tipp Tipp rang out, Clare wides were being jeered by the home crowd.
Late goal brought it back to 3 before Marco Cleary postage stamped one at the death to level it. Then Costello wins it at the death to ram it down the home crowds throat.
Great win despite missing five scorable frees. This group never die
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3 good goal chances missed, hit the post twice and five missed frees. Draw would have probably been fair. Tipp forwards worked very hard without the ball second half to stop Clareās running game.
Matthew OāHalloran smoked Tobin - a bad few days for him.
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Everything youād expect from one of Terenceās teams.
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I was saying after about 55 minutes tonight that the excitement and fun has gone out of these 20s games in the last few years. The last 3 minutes tonight more than made up for it! Really great win and sets us up big time for Cork next week. As @Big_Dan_Campbell mentioned above, to silence the Tipp,Tipp,Tipp chants and the apes jeering Rodgers missing a free, is absolutely beautiful.
Itāll definitely be described as a smash and grab, and I donāt necessarily disagree, but I believe that a Clare win by 1 is a much fairer reflection of the game that Tipp being up by 6 going into injury time. Iām not saying Clare were by far the better team, more so that it was very even on the whole. Tippās superior forwards meant they scored far easier when they did get half a chance, while our superior backs meant our forwards got plenty of ball fed in.
I was surprised Tipp didnāt play an out and out sweeper. Murray did sit deep as their 6, but I was expecting a much more withdrawn set up from them. I thought it was a clever move by Fahy and co. to swap Loftus and Casey so credit to them, Loftus is brilliant at coming off the shoulder and helping create overlaps, that was particularly evident in the first half tonight. We started out brilliantly tonight, hurled Tipp off the park in the first 10 minutes but just couldnāt convert. Even if we hadnāt pulled the victory out at the end, Iād still have been positive about our performance. On another day , Fred nails 4 more frees and we take one of our goal chances and we donāt need the late heroics.
Everybody loves to talk about a skilful forward or a flashy wing back, but I have to say I really enjoyed the performances from the less mentioned grafters of the team. Iād say Casey and O Hallorans men have 3 or 4 points scored between them in the first 3 games. At the end of the day a backs first job is to stop his man from influencing the game, and theyāve done that so far to some top forwards, who have hurt other teams big time. Costelloe and Ball midfield are a terrific pairing. Iām delighted that Costelloe will get some plaudits for his late scores, but truth be told, he should have been getting the all along for the defensive work he does and the work he does on breaks. Ball has it all, he just looks the part of a top quality midfielder. Heās always there to clean up a loose ball, covers a ton of ground and he has no little skill either. It didnāt really run for Kilroy tonight, but the amount of work and effort he puts in really sets an example for the rest of the team.
A lot of good came off of Tom O Connor, Iād say he won 80% of ball that went in. He never really looks fully in control of himself but it seems to usually work out for him. Thereās definitely potential in there. Collins got through a lot of work too and Sean Arthur made a nice impact off of the bench.
Have to mention the ref too, I actually enjoyed how much he let it go. He made some bizarre calls but I donāt think you could complain he favoured one side over the other. Maybe Iām biased but I donāt think you could really argue the red card.
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OāHalloran is the type of player Kilkenny seemed to have an endless supply of in Codyās time. He just erases forwards from the game. Bit more confidence in his striking and he will definitely be worth a look down the line.
Hard to assess Fahy. 3 from 3 including a win over a decent Tipp in Thurles would normally be an A+. But in reality we were on course to lose a very even contest by 5 or 6. We donāt generate the return on possession that we should. Instead of going up 5 or 6 we are always caught in a trench war.
The thing is his teamās are incredibly good at trench warfare. I canāt remember a Clare team that so consistently ground out results in tense game. Lohanās Clare probably the only comparison. He has something but what it is itās hard to say.
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Forward play has always been a let down. In his five years itās always been a case of hoping a couple of individuals deliver rather than a cohesive unit.
This is an excellent team 1 to 9. The only issue Iād have with it is that neither wing back is capable of delivering half decent ball into the forwards which limits them a bit. We could do with a bit more aerial threat in the half forwards too - maybe they push Hayes up if Hegarty is right, Harry Doherty the other option but doubt he would be picked ahead of the others.
The forward selections have been a bit hit and hope. Itās as if playing the first two games on a cold, heavy and tight pitch wasnāt taken into account when selecting top of the ground hurlers inside.
They dealt with two significant injuries to their first and second choice center backs which would have torpedoed any Clare underage team before.
A little bit of stability up front to build around OāConnor at 14 and Collins on the wing would help.
Kilroy is a utility player but you can only really play Hegarty at 6 so it will lead to more shuffling in the forwards if they bring him in and shift Hayes forward.
Good to see David mcinerney and the extended panel all hurling Clare cup this morning
I havenāt watched it back yet but it felt like that match turned on Rodgers missing a goal chance before Walsh went up and scored his opportunity down the other end. Pretty frustrating night overall, self sabotage costing us a place in the final.
I thought we were set up badly, particularly in the half back line. Walsh started at 11 and we had OāHalloran detailed to follow him everywhere. That move worked, Walsh didnāt do much until he went inside in the 2nd half. It left an absolute chasm down the middle at times though, and neither Hayes nor Moylan had any interest in filling it. They were both caught in no mans land, neither following nor covering any space in front of the full back line. Also at puckout time I thought we were awful naive. Everyone following their man into a big bunch on the wing and leaving and entire half of the field vacant. The most basic goal of setting your team up is to have more space created in their half than yours, and Cork certainly won that battle. Their free man in Garde was far more visible than ours and they got far more bodies around breaks, where they dominated us.
Positives were the form of most of our forwards. Collins, Kilroy, Fred, OāConnor and
Doherty off the bench all did well. Collins in particular was excellent, covered the world of ground and got some nice scores. We got a fair bit of joy from long direct ball in, with OāConnor as the target. Weāll definitely try make use of it again next week, Cork are lacking in size at the back. It doesnāt really suit Boyce to play the withdrawn role. Iād probably just play 3 inside and keep the ball going in narrow. Or else we could just pick a 3rd midfielder, the main point is that weāve got very little return from that role in the 4 games weāve played.
The full back line did a lot of good but also a lot of bad, particularly Loftus. They won a heap of foot races and generally did better in 50/50s but unfortunately the amount of ball they coughed up cost us the game. Gunning was brutal for the 1st goal and Loftus was probably at fault for both 3rd and 4th goals. Iād probably have left OāHalloran on Walsh wherever he went, Loftus tends to play a bit too free and aggressive for a full back at times. Loftus would give you more on the ball out the field than OāHalloran, and its not like OāHalloran has never played in the full back line before. Something to look at for the next day.
I would caveat the turnovers somewhat too. Obviously the bulk of the blame is at Loftus/Caseys feet, but they werenāt helped by how deep our half forward line were. Iām sure theyād have liked to have struck the ball but when you look up and theres a red wall on their 65, youāve no choice but to carry it.
Looking onto next week, Iād be fairly confident. Obviously even more so if Walsh is held back for senior duty. Hegarty has to come in for Hayes and if Keane is fit Iād have him in half back too. Costelloe will hardly be as quiet aswell and Ball has room to improve too. Only real call up front is whether Doherty comes in for Boyce from the start. Lot of pressure on Fahy now for next week, if he loses next week itād surely be thank you and good luck.
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On balance itās hard to argue weāre hard done by finishing with 3 & 1. Eked out two wins and did a smash and grab for the other. The resilience theyāve shown is outstanding and their best quality. But they are yet, across the 4 games, to dominate at team for 10-15 minutes and make it tell on the scoreboard. They are capable of winning it out but they are incapable of making life easy for themselves.