Liam Sheedy: Last tickets for the redemption bus to Croke Park

Pupils of Scoil Chroí Íosa, Blarney, during an interview session with, from left, Eddie Gibbons of Dublin, Aaron Niland of Galway and Killian Sampson of Offaly. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

Jubilant scenes at the final whistles in Cork and Croker two weeks ago should leave nobody in any doubt about the significance of our provincial hurling championships. And any suggestion of ever removing them should be banished.

For Galway, there was a certain amount of relief after previous lacklustre efforts to capture the Bob O’Keeffe. For Limerick, I’d imagine the thrill was in proving to themselves they can still find that next level you need to go to in winning big matches. This bunch know that feeling well.

It was brilliant seeing the footage online of the Limerick lads socialising and singing among their supporters afterwards. In English football these days, there’s a fashion to call the ‘celebration police’ and criticise anybody seen to be enjoying themselves too much before the whole job is done. I hope we never entertain that kind of talk.

One of the downsides of the condensed calendar is there is very little chance during the season to interact with your people. Every time you hear a player talk, he’s on about swiftly recovering and moving on to the next challenge. It gets relentless. So it’s lovely to see amateurs enjoy a rare moment to mark success with their families, friends and supporters. And it’s a pity only provincial winners get that little bit of breathing space with the current calendar.

The Hurling Review Committee is a positive development as we should always be looking to improve our game. But equally I would welcome a review of the hurling calendar to ensure we have the right structure to deliver the best possible outcomes for clubs and counties. Same as the rules, no massive overhaul is needed, but a few minor amendments could yield favourable results.

The flip side of that provincial final buzz is picking yourself up as a loser. Cork’s formline in Munster this year matches up well with my second stint with Tipp in 2019. Having won all four matches in the round robin, we succumbed to Limerick in the final. Certainly, the healing process should be easier for Ben and Cork as they were in that final right to the end, whereas we were completely outclassed and overrun in the last 20 minutes.

But there’s still an emotional reset needed. And not much time to get things right. A week really to do serious work, then another to fine-tune and polish for next Sunday.

In our case, all the external talk was on the scale of our collapse. Whereas inside the camp our thinking was to switch the focus onto the 280 minutes throughout the group where we had shown what we were capable of. 

The debrief was good and the group agreed we had got loads from the Munster Championship and now it was all about the All-Ireland series and putting three performances back to back. Delivering three times what we had already done four times on the spin. We had also sowed the seeds well in advance about Croker being the place where we would find another level.

With Gerry Hussey, a master of mindset, on the case, I’m sure Ben will have steeled Cork for this weekend. Croke Park performances will define this team but the immediate focus is to get there.

Their opponents Offaly have been the success story of the championship. At the outset, wisdom had their final outing with Kildare down as a relegation shootout. How wrong that was. To have marched through Leinster only losing to champions Galway speaks volumes for the standard and spirit within the group.

It is a super case study for everybody the way Offaly have escorted through a core group of young players to supplement what was already there. And don’t underestimate Johnny Kelly’s incredible work in that process. The impact of winners progressing from underage to senior is great, but only as long as they are being well coached and managed to fully deliver on their potential.

Johnny has assembled top-class people around him. Brendan Maher and Seamie Callanan have achieved so much as Tipperary players and I have no doubt their influence is massive on the players and the style of play. Brendan’s brother and former Tipp player Martin is a hugely respected coach in the county and Tony Gleeson from Burgess has built on his impressive CV with Kilcormac and the Offaly 20s to complement a setup which has Offaly back competing well in the top tier.

They must, however, have left Páirc Uí Chaoimh after the last round of the league alarmed. Defeat wasn't the issue, but the margin of Cork’s victory, 6-26 to 0-20, seemed to show a gulf still to be bridged. It also pointed to a ruthless approach from the Rebels. That won’t be lost on Johnny or the players and motivation won’t be in short supply in the Offaly dressing room on Sunday. The mantra will be ‘hang in there’ and bring this down the home straight. It’s a tall ask but I expect a much closer battle and a significantly tighter margin.

Saturday evening brings a repeat of the Division 1B league final, where Clare laid the foundations for victory with an impressive first half 2-15. The word ringing in my ear for both these teams is redemption.

Clare stuttered over the line against Waterford before surrendering without any fight to their massive rivals and neighbours in their home patch. They delivered their best performance when the need was greatest in Thurles to secure qualification before rolling over once again in Leeside.

The Clare fans who made that long journey to Cork and who were starting on the return trip well before the end will be expecting a serious reaction.

Which Clare will turn up on Saturday? With four weeks to go after the healing process, you would expect them to come roaring out of the blocks in a stadium that has been good to them of late. Firing them up aside, you’d imagine Brian Lohan will restore the structure that allowed a dominant John Conlon be central to the performance against Tipp, compared to the lack of cohesion against Cork that rendered him redundant. He may as well have been sitting behind Brian in the Páirc as the game was played around him and on the opposition’s terms.

Lohan will hardly let that happen again. After all the ups and down this season, he’ll be licking his lips for another shot at Limerick and redemption for that May massacre in Cusack Park.

The story is similar for Niall Ó Ceallacháin. After doing incredibly well to stay unbeaten through Leinster, in the final Dublin just didn’t replicate anything that had got them there. Niall seemed perplexed after the game and was devoid of answers for the capitulation.

Two weeks isn’t an easy reset, but if this group was offered a quarter-final with Clare at the start of the road, they’d probably have signed for that. Like us in 2019, Niall nearly has to scrub that Galway game from the memory banks and remind his players what they are capable of.

With both sides on the redemption bus, a spectacle looks certain. A fully fired-up Clare might just have the edge but if they bring anything like the lethargy on show against Limerick and Cork their season will be over and some careers too.