Half an hour or so after Russell Rovers' defeat at Croke Park, Michael Mannion was still struggling to find the right words to explain it all away.

It was only the first step on the road, but Wexford put down a marker as they beat Kilkenny to secure a place in the Walsh Cup final.

A four-month old baby who was diagnosed with Spina Bifida in the womb looks set to be able to walk with the aid of a splint following revolutionary treatment in Belgium.

On the eve of the roaring twenties, John Fogarty hails the doyens of the last decade in hurling

Kilkenny goalkeeper Eoin Murphy has written off 2019 as “a waste of a year” despite reaching the Leinster and All-Ireland hurling finals.

Kilkenny are champions of the inaugural New York Hurling Classic after a convincing 24-point win over Limerick in Citi Field.

Former Kilkenny forward Christy Heffernan argues DJ Carey’s imminent appointment to Brian Cody’s management team is a necessary one for the team’s hiccuping attack.

Ten years ought to constitute a sufficient sample size for undertakings such as these and in the present instance it does. It was not a difficult team to pick, nor should it have been.

Patrick Horgan has been shortlisted for 2019 PwC Hurler of the Year award, along with Tipperary and Kilkenny captains Séamus Callanan and TJ Reid.

In the aftermath of their 2014 All-Ireland final loss to Kilkenny, Eamon O’Shea defiantly declared that “This team (Tipp) will always have hope, they have great character, and the nucleus of this team will go on in the future and win All-Irelands.”

Given that much of the focus on last Sunday’s All-Ireland SHC final revolved around Richie Hogan’s sending off, arguably the most important moment of the match has almost gone underappreciated.

Michael Moynihan has rung all the juries, collated all the votes, and accepted all the bribes.

The team includes six players from All-Ireland champions Tipperary and four from beaten finalists Kilkenny.

Sending offs can have major influences on a game.

Trust me when I say this — it’s every referee’s worst nightmare to send a player off in an All-Ireland final.

One county is ecstatic this morning and one despairing, as is always the case after an All-Ireland final.

A final for the annals but certainly not for the ages.

As a gauge of how competitive the All-Ireland final was, the free-taking sequence for both sides tells an interesting story.

Victorious Tipperary manager Liam Sheedy accepts Richie Hogan’s sending-off had “a huge bearing” on the All-Ireland final, but says he didn’t see the foul on Cathal Barrett that led to the red card.

As a gauge of how competitive the All-Ireland final was, the free-taking sequence for both sides tells an interesting story.

In the Father Ted episode where a bomb was planted on Dougal’s milk float, two fellow priests and a tense Ted were involved in a major planning session.

On October 7, 2010, a month after winning the All Ireland and stopping Kilkenny’s five-in-a-row, Liam Sheedy's Tipperary management team announced they were stepping down.

Four powerful strikers have battled their way through the most demanding of weather conditions to contest this morning’s semi-finals of the AIG Irish Close Championship at Ballybunion.

And then there were two — but how many of the Kilkenny and Tipperary teams are in the driving seat for All-Stars? John Fogarty makes his shouts

The GAA’s newly-appointed national match officials manager is open to the idea of more technology being used to assist referees, but has questioned just how far it can go.

Perhaps as the two of them relaxed some evening in Cambridge, Seamus Heaney enlightened Derek Walcott about hurling and Croke Park and what happens when the known universe narrows into a man standing over a sideline cut with time running out on another season.

The Cats were better than the Munster and All-Ireland champions for the vast proportion of this game.

As Limerick reached the promised land last year, they won three tight games — Kilkenny, Cork (after extra-time), and Galway.

Not to put too fine a point on it but Kilkenny won the All-Ireland quarter-final largely because they were playing — and were allowed to play by and play through — Cork. Not to put too fine a point on it but they’re unlikely to win the All-Ireland semi-final largely because they’ll be playing — and will not be allowed to play by and play through — Limerick.

Eoin Murphy feels compelled to make the distinction between a Leinster title and an All-Ireland crown.

And so, 14 years becomes 15, one short of Cork’s longest spell without the Liam MacCarthy Cup.

Patrick’s Horgan heroic 3-10 wasn’t enough to save Cork as Kilkenny’s second-half strength proved too much for them.

What does the number on your back even mean any more in hurling? Michael Moynihan rooted through the bag of jerseys and asked how the job spec for each position has changed

Wexford’s dreams of completing a clean sweep of all three Leinster minor titles for the first time since 1970 is still very much alive after they came through a stern test of their credentials last night in Tullamore, withstanding a late surge from a fiercely competitive Offaly side before wrapping up their win with an injury-time goal from Diarmuid Doyle.

Kilkenny are still just one victory away from being in an All-Ireland SHC semi-final despite their three-point loss to Wexford in the Leinster final last Sunday.

Wexford have taken the physical battle for possession to a level beyond even Kilkenny’s great four-in-a-row All-Ireland winners, believes former Cats captain Brian Hogan.

About half an hour after the final whistle in Croke Park yesterday, as the Wexford players were still celebrating on the pitch, I ran into a bunch of Wexford supporters I last met in Down Royal racecourse years ago.

On June 17, 2012, Waterford goalkeeper Stephen O’Keeffe (affectionately known as Soky) spotted an opportunity.

It now seems with every week that the GAA are being given more reason to cut down on the numbers populating the sidelines.

The revamped hurling championship has given us many wondrous memories this last 13 months but the sight of Wexford and Kilkenny supporters jiving away together to the tune of 'Dancing at the Crossroads' may well be the most bizarre.

A body language expert wasn’t required to work out Brian Cody’s mood in the wake of Sunday’s defeat to Galway.

These may be frustrating times for Kilkenny’s Eoin Murphy, but he knows that things could be much worse, as the temperatures begin to rise.

They once were kings, these two houses both alike in dignity. They had heavy artillery and high explosive and machine guns and sniper rifles and famous generals and crack marksmen and plentiful reserves.

Castlelyons’ Niall O’Leary is the new face in the named Cork team to take on Tipperary in Sunday’s Munster SHC Round 1 clash as John Meyler goes with 13 of the team that were defeated by Limerick in last year’s All-Ireland semi-final.