Breaking Munster’s vicious circle
There have been days in 2004 and 2009 when Limerick footballers came tantalisingly close to their first championship since 1896. Then in 2002, Tipperary footballers very nearly had their first day in the sun since 1935 but in recent years the existential angst brought about by the start of each championship year in Munster has been accompanied by a vainly diminishing hope that the predictability of it all would one day be sundered.
For a brief period around this time last year, the romantics still harboured notions of Tipperary being the team to break the duopoly that has existed in Munster football since the Banner breakthrough. This was largely based on Tipp’s successive promotions in the national league and on the sense that both Kerry and Cork either might not value another Munster title or indeed, might not even benefit from winning another. There are however, two related lessons to be learnt from the first and final game of the 2009 Munster football championship: when your county hasn’t won a game in a provincial championship for six (make that seven this year) seasons and secondly, when your county hasn’t won a provincial championship in 113 (make that 114 this year) years it can be an almighty difficult task trying to break through that glass ceiling ignoring the heavy hand of history.
John Evans and Mickey Ned O’Sullivan will correctly argue that the current squads bear very little responsibility for the failings of the past but tradition does count for something in championship football.
It might for example, explain why it took Tipp 32 minutes to register a score in the first round against Limerick last year, and how in the corresponding fixture the previous year (Evans’ first championship match with Tipp) they managed just one point during the entire second half – a free in the last minute.
Stage fright can affect all teams and speaking after their Munster exit last year, Evans remarked that “when it comes to the white heat of championship I think in due course this very, very young team will respond”.
There are indeed signs that the young players are in fact responding ahead of time to Evans’ promptings but the fact that Kerry are likely to be forewarned by the disappointment of the recent U21 defeat in Tralee, makes another defeat in Semple tomorrow unthinkable.
Even when freed from the shackles of Munster Championship tradition, Tipperary, for all their recent progress, haven’t always burnt a trail through the qualifiers which are only now in their 10th year of existence. Winning two of 10 matches in the qualifiers does not indicate any great willingness on Tipperary’s part to embrace the qualifier system. With a developing team and some real quality emerging from the U21 ranks, there are those who would argue that the qualifier system is a better vehicle for progress than successive elevation up the divisions in the league.
That may remain a moot point but it is fair to say that wins at home against Meath and Westmeath and a draw away to Down in Division Two will have served Tipperary football better than any previous scalps in the lower divisions.
As things are, Tipperary will surely expect to ask some hard questions of a defence containing three players recovering from injury (Marc O Sé, Tomás O Sé and Killian Young), one player appearing for the first time since last year’s All Ireland (Mike McCarthy), a new goalkeeper and a full back in Tommy Griffin who despite some assured performances last year, is still struggling manfully to become an out and out full-back.
Evans’ knowledge of Kerry football will inform his attacking strategies and he is highly unlikely to play into opposition hands by allowing Seamus Scanlon and the two wing forwards, Paul Galvin and Donnchadh Walsh drop back and sit in the pocket behind midfield lapping up poor quality ball. The key from a Tipperary point of view is being patient in their attempts to get the ball into Barry Grogan and company in the inside line. If they are allowed time on the ball to build attacks from deep and if Christy Aylward and the experienced Robbie Costigan are allowed surge forward, Tipperary can be as potent as any team.
The ball is very much in Kerry’s court on this one and a few early aggressive and legitimate tackles could set the tone for the day. We know that Kerry will get that aggression from their half-forward line. If Bryan Sheehan, Colm Cooper and Kieran Donaghy inside them decide to add hard, consistent and unrelenting tackling to their already impressive scoring repertory, there can only be one outcome.
With a wearying sense of resignation and metronomic predictability, then, we can see nothing other that a Kerry-Cork clash in three weeks.
