At this time of the year everybody is forced to think again. Anybody who thought Tipperary were “quiet” and “flying under the radar” and “waiting in the long grass” didn’t get the kind of performance they were expecting in Thurles. People thought Kilkenny would turn up in Salthill hell bent on vengeance after their 18-point beating in the league, but that didn’t happen either.
Nobody was sure what to expect from Cork, but they came up with something that was nothing like their performance in the league final a fortnight earlier. With all the baggage from Croke Park last July they needed to win last Sunday, and they dealt with that pressure. It didn’t matter how they won.
But now they must think again. The performance they gave against Tipp won’t be good enough against Limerick. Tactically, their approach will have to be fundamentally different.
Last Sunday, they deliberately engaged the Tipperary half-back line, as if they were set-up to play against a sweeper. Darragh Fitzgibbon, Shane Barrett and Barry Walsh were on a world of ball and scored 12 points between them.
But the last thing they’ll want to do against Limerick is bring their half-back line into the game. When Cork beat Limerick in Páirc Uí Chaoimh two years ago, their approach centred around getting the ball over the Limerick half-backs.
The other thing they’ll have to adjust is their puck-outs. In Thurles last Sunday, both goalkeepers managed to find players in pockets of space inside their half and moved the ball from there. Against Limerick, that approach is asking for trouble.
They’re really good at tempting teams into playing short or mid-range puck-outs and then turning them over. Against Limerick, Cork will have to be more direct than they were last Sunday. Landing puck-outs on Brian Hayes in the D has not been as productive as it was in 2024, and it was one of Cork’s weaknesses in last year’s All-Ireland final, but they will have to try it more often than they did in Thurles.
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As Cork have discovered over the years, it is pointless to play a sweeper against Limerick. If Kyle Hayes or Cian Lynch or Adam English or Diarmaid Byrnes are allowed to dictate the play and be unopposed hitting the ball into Aaron Gillane or Shane O’Brien, there is no corner back or full back who can do anything to defend it. You must push up on Limerick all over the field. In fairness to Cork, going toe-to-toe with Limerick has been their approach over the last three years.
The league final is already irrelevant. It was obvious looking at Cork last Sunday that they weren’t prepared to spend any more energy than was necessary in the Gaelic Grounds a couple of weeks earlier. Their focus was Tipp. Limerick had an extra week between the end of the league and the start of the championship and for their own reasons they had clearly targeted winning the competition.
They were favourites for the All-Ireland before last weekend, and without pucking a ball that hasn’t changed. The 10 other teams in the championship lined out last weekend and you could pick holes in all of them. In that sense, Limerick are still a blank page.
But I think they’re in a better place than they were this time last year, and Cork’s performance last Sunday didn’t answer all the questions about them. There might only be a point or two in it, but I think Limerick will have the edge.
Kilkenny and Tipperary will both be looking for an immediate response after what happened last weekend. Probably because of my own experiences of playing against Kilkenny, I was really afraid of what they would bring to Salthill last Saturday. I was expecting a performance of savage intensity, like we’ve seen a million times before from them: hooking, blocking, tackling. That didn’t materialise.
Kilkenny are a team struggling for an identity at the moment and that was probably the biggest difference between the teams on Saturday. Galway are very clear about how they want to set-up and how they want to move the ball. They have some terrific young players in the team and they have legs and they’re comfortable playing a running/possession type game.
Kilkenny would like to hit the ball long all the time and take their chances in one-on-one duels. This was the way they won their All-Irelands under Brian Cody and it is how the club game is played in Kilkenny. But that approach is much less effective on the intercounty scene now. When Galway were defending last Saturday, they had plenty of players behind the ball. One-on-one duels are much harder to generate.
So, Kilkenny are stuck between the way they would like to play and the way they feel they should play. Until they clear that up, it is hard to see them challenging for the All-Ireland.
Team selection is another issue. In the massive absence of Huw Lawlor they have tried to make a full-back out of Mikey Carey and it hasn’t worked. For some reason they have moved Richie Reid from centre back to wing back and swapped him with Daragh Corcoran, even though Ballyhale Shamrocks play Reid at six and Corcoran on the wing.
In the forward line they haven’t worked out how best to use Eoin Cody either. He spent a lot of time at centre forward in the early rounds of the league but last Saturday he started inside and drifted out. They need to find a way to maximise his influence.
Wexford will smell blood and if this game was in Wexford Park I think they would have a great chance. It will be interesting to see if the Kilkenny crowd will come out to support the team because thousands of them have gone missing, but being at home will be a big help to Kilkenny.
That’s also true for Waterford. They will take a lot of encouragement from their performance in Ennis. It wasn’t perfect but it was promising. Tipp can’t afford to be as flat as they were last Sunday, but they were in deeper holes than this at various times last year and they dug themselves out of it.
This fixture was a draw two years ago. Another draw wouldn’t surprise me.
