Last year’s beaten finalists Breaffy crashed out of the Mayo SFC over the weekend as the four semi-finalists in this season’s competition were decided.

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

Jerome Cahill’s pinch-me moment? Easy, the Tipp dressing room on the evening of Saturday, January 26.

There are match-ups all over the field that will be key. That’s the great thing about Tipperary-Kilkenny matches — both sides tend to go orthodox and are 15-on-15.

Liam Sheedy didn’t want to talk about Kilkenny. Which was fair enough.

Irrespective of how tomorrow’s Munster final plays out, Ronan Maher will point the car for Templemore on Monday morning to begin the first day of his new career.

Liam Sheedy has said he owed it to the survivors of the 2010 All-Ireland-winning Tipperary team to return as manager.

Explain Cork-Tipperary in thirty words or less? Or even 1,200 words or less?

We are a week into Munster Championship Lent. The 40 days and 40 nights before the start of the Munster SHC on May 12 commenced last Tuesday.

After Dublin lost to Clare in the 2012 qualifiers in Ennis, Jamesie O’Connor wrote in his newspaper column the following day that Dublin had played “caveman hurling”.

Galway split their squad at the weekend, with half of them playing Ballygunner in a challenge match in Claregalway and the remainder brushing Laois aside in their opening game in Division 1B yesterday at Pearse Stadium.

When it comes to back-to-back success, Kilkenny, to the surprise of absolutely nobody, are the market leaders. Seven times a Kilkenny team has successfully defended Liam MacCarthy in the 30 years since Galway managed this feat.

Dublin may have had 30,000 runners pounding its streets in the women’s mini marathon but all attention went Lee-side.

Tommy Walsh has likened the new championship format to Game of Thrones. Brendan Cummins described it “rats-in-a-barrel” stuff. One episode in and already the worst is being feared. Taking Walsh’s analogy, Tipperary and Clare are, spoiler alert, Ned Starks in the making.

I got talking to Joe McKenna in the Gaelic Grounds yesterday shortly after the final whistle. Joe was naturally on a high, as was the whole Limerick crowd, a good share of whom were down on the pitch basking in the warm afterglow of such an impressive win, writes Anthony Daly.

When I was Clare manager, we played Limerick in the league semi-final in 2006 in Thurles. The game went to extra-time but it nearly seemed that both teams were more concerned with losing the match than winning it, writes Anthony Daly.

Michael Ryan may have produced the tactical masterstroke of the season when he shifted Ronan Maher into Tipperary’s midfield.

Just when it seemed hurling was entering a post-Kilkenny-Tipp era, the first national final of the year is… Kilkenny-Tipp. It’s something to relish, writes Kieran Shannon.

Jack McCarron’s audacity last Sunday has re-opened the debate about the great Croke Park Gaelic football goals. 

Former Kilkenny captain Eoin Larkin said it’s natural that some pundits want to believe the county are hitting a fallow period but warned Brian Cody has other ideas.

‘Jinkin Joe’ Corcoran, scorer of 20-358 in Mayo inter-county career.

More than 50,000 supporters turned out across Galway to greet the All- Ireland hurling champions as they returned home, having won the senior and minor titles for the first time in the same year.

Galway hurling selector Noel Larkin says the All-Ireland final will be better for Austin Gleeson’s involvement, writes Eoghan Cormican.

Galway hurling selector Noel Larkin says the All-Ireland final will be better for Austin Gleeson’s involvement.

A rural community has been plunged into mourning after three women died in a horror three-vehicle road traffic smash as they travelled home from a holiday.

A rural community has been plunged into mourning after three women died in a horror three-vehicle road traffic smash as they travelled home from a holiday.

The number of cyclists killed on Irish roads in 2017 so far has already matched the total amount of those who lost their lives on bikes last year.

Mahers' power and hard running should be vital for the Premier, says Peter McNamara.

Getting hot under the collars of their tunics and neckerchiefs were 27 young chefs from second-level schools throughout Munster, bound by their passion for food and their ambition to take part in the 2016/17 Flogas Ireland and Fáilte Ireland Apprentice Chef Programme.

Two Cork teens have claimed the scalp of the British school that boasts 19 former UK prime ministers by talking their way to a prestigious debating title.

On the way home from the Gaelic Grounds yesterday, I was snaking my way out the Ennis Road in my car when I saw Conor Hayes at the side of the road.

Galway 3-31 Laois 1-11: Galway thrashed Laois by 36 points the last time these sides met in the league back in 2008, and for a good while yesterday it seemed they might even surpass that margin.

Tipperary captain Padraic Maher says there’s plenty of young talent coming through in the county but they must take their chances in the league if they want to experience championship glory first hand.

By his own admission, Galway’s 1980 Liam MacCarthy-winning captain Joe Connolly only played one game of football in his life. 

Former Galway All-Star nominee Pádraic Mannion says playing hurling in Division 1B won’t put the Tribesmen at any disadvantage heading into the championship.

Clare football manager Colm Collins has lamented “the death of the dual player”, which he says has come about due to the fixture congestion brought on by the qualifier system.

‘A great asset to the club, a great man to have’