Absolutely. You have only 1 team that can and will win the All Ireland in hurling this year, Limerick.
Double that in football as either Kerry or Dublin will win it.
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I see a number of pundits suggest Kilkenny weren’t trying and are weighting in the long grass.
Pity mental if it’s the case that a team in the final of the second biggest national competition is not even trying to win the game.
Consider the fact the league takes up over a 1/4 of the calendar year. We’d surely be better if a proper club championship starting paddies day and maybe finals weekend this week instead.
Who? Where?
We also heard the theory cork didn’t want to face Limerick in the final to receive another thumping.
I heard this too but think it was complete bollocks and which is why I’ve very low expectations for Championship this year.
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There’s a lot of bullshit theories put out there about teams under performing.
You play in a semi-final/final, you go out to win. Don’t be believing bullshit. Kilkenny weren’t good enough, neither were Cork.
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A lad I know in Watergrasshill tells me Kilkenny did a savage morning’s training there yesterday.
Exactly.
The main reason teams get beaten in the league is they are trying out players and don’t have depth.
Clare for example, have the bare 15 and even one of their top players like Conlon or Kelly is not playing they are 6 points worse off.
The notion of training blocks falls into the category of bullshit excuses for managers and by extension weirdo media gurus who don’t go to club games and don’t know Brian Hayes is actually shite compared to Robbie O’Flynn.
The “traditional” teams always win soft all Ireland’s. I don’t mean that as a criticism. But when the door opens for them they take it. Tipp win one every decade. When things fall apart one of the traditional three in hurling are generally there to pick up the pieces and take a handy one. They win hard ones too of course with great teams often against one of the other traditional teams. But how they really rack up the numbers is being there constantly and taking one every now and again.
My dream for Limerick is when this all ends, and it will as quickly as it started (and before anyone expects). That we could join the big three in winning all Ireland’s every now and again without necessarily having a great team. I would hope that this success will drive young lads to play hurling and going forward teams won’t carry any of the baggage previous teams had to carry and will be able to find their way to finals when they maybe don’t deserve it, but have the power of believing Limerick are good enough just by being Limerick as the other three do.
It’s a big ask. We currently don’t have the numbers of the other three. I believe it is a fact that more clubs in Limerick play football than hurling strangely enough. But hopefully this rising tide can lift all boats. There is loads of work to do in this regard, in the city in particular. Hopefully we don’t take our eye off the ball.
Cork are now at a point where they need an all Ireland. They’ve never been at that point before in my lifetime at least. And it begins to weigh on players. Tradition is a double edged sword in that regard. With great expectations come great expectations. They look to have their house in order underage and their weight of numbers will carry them over the line eventually but they will find it hard to win the first one. Because they are getting desperate for it.
Kerry in football are another example. The belief that being Kerry makes them good enough carrys them a long way.
Mayo on the other hand have the tradition of being losers. It is a very tough tag to shake. That all Ireland Vs Tyrone was a gift and they couldn’t take it. Limerick were buried by the weight of it for long enough. It takes a special team to turn that around
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Good point regarding Limerick club hurling.
There’s huge swathes of the city that are being untapped and there are plenty of clubs in the West with no hurling.
Cork have huge numbers whilst in Tipperary (north & mid especially) and Kilkenny, hurling is the only thing that matters.
What invariably drags them all down when they have good teams is they have a bare 12 or 13, carrying 2 or 3 passengers/weak links and that’s before you even get to the subs bench. It’s a 20/21 man game now. When Clare/Offaly/Wexford won those All Ireland’s in the mid 90’s, they had the bare 15 if even that. Back then you didn’t really need a subs bench. In the 1996 All Ireland Final, Wexford only threw on their subs Billy Byrne and Paul Codd in the last few minutes.
Round robin blitz format and 6 substitutes just exacerbate such demographic and structural issues.
A 5 week club championship starting in March?
Trying to think of what were the softest All-Irelands in football and hurling.
My main criterion for soft All-Ireland is not beating the team considered the best or your biggest rivals.
Kerry in 1997 for sure. Kerry in 2004. Softer again. Beat nobody.
Kerry 1986, they beat a Meath team not yet at the races. Kerry 2006, they beat an Armagh team slightly over the hill, but not Tyrone.
Kerry 2009. Didn’t beat Tyrone. Kerry 2014. Didn’t beat Dublin.
Dublin 2018. Beat nobody, would have won anyway.
Tyrone 2021. Didn’t beat Dublin.
Hurling, Tipp in 2019. Beat Wexford.
Clare in 2013. Didn’t beat Kilkenny. Didn’t beat Tipp.
Tipp in 1989. Beat Galway who were in a sulk.
Offaly 1998, the way it happened. Beat Clare but Clare were punch drunk.
Clare 1995 was softish compared to 1997. There have been harder All-Irelands won than Wexford in 1996.
Kilkenny 2000 was soft as shit, though they would have won anyway.
Galway 1980 was soft. Beat Eamon Cregan.
Hurling: Kilkenny in 2007 and 2008
Sorry Perez I meant like the Munster
Club finals or something like that. Let the teams enjoy the county final wins. Anything be better than this pointless league anyway surely.
Here’s one for you. Non big three hurling counties to make a breakthrough win against a big 3 hurling county.
In recent times Offaly and Wexford beat Limerick. Clare beat Offaly. Galway beat Waterford (and Limerick in 1980). Limerick beat Galway.
Clare v Cork in 2013 is one. A poor cork side tbf.
You could say Galway in 87, if you don’t consider it tied to the 1980 win.
But generally the breakthrough is when two non traditional teams meet
In football Donegal and Tyrone Vs Mayo. Tyrone again Vs Armagh. Cork Vs Down. You would be going back to Armagh v Kerry I’d say
We have been through this 1000 times.
April for clubs was a good break between league and championship but it had 2 main problems…
1: many counties ignored the supposed 4 weeks of club games and went on training camps after 1 or 2 games.
2: Clubs had to be back in pre season in January for 1/2 championship games that could potentially make or break your year.
As a supporter I share your frustrations to a degree but it was madness before having a 10 month club season.
Obviously, it would be great to have a situation where we could have a club weekend each month but it’s impossible when you build in the various permutations such as u20, dual clubs etc.
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Limerick 1973 is the only one I can think of in hurling.
Wexford’s breakthrough in 1955 was against Limerick in the semi-final and Galway who got a bye to the final.
In football, Down in 1960 and Armagh in 2002 were against Kerry. Donegal against Dublin in 1992.
Edit: Waterford against Kilkenny 1959.