Galway saying to themselves: Why not us this year? And it could be

My day got off to a bad start. The Limerick minors were beaten by Galway. It was disappointing but we could have no real complaints.

Overall, we played five games, three in Thurles. When I was a Clare minor back in 1987, we played one game, a two-point defeat to Cork in Kilmallock. That was my minor days done and dusted.

Back then, Cork were always the underage benchmark. They’d been in an All-Ireland minor final in 1986. They went on to win the All-Ireland U21 title in 1988 after scraping by us in Kilmallock again. They showed up in another All-Ireland minor final in 1990. They won the senior title the same year. It was no surprise they were the kings of hurling but the underage success has dried up and there is a direct correlation to that reality and what we saw in Thurles yesterday.