Should you bring war or phoney war to the league quarter-finals?
There were TV cameras rolling but no one was sparing or clipping punch bags because the place had gone derelict. It was a great location for a photoshoot but was sad because I was well aware of the great history of the club.
It had been established back in 1929 and had produced some of the legends of Irish boxing. None other than Kilkenny great Mick Dowling had boxed out of the club, allegedly picking it because the club wore the black and amber colours. Thank God someone gave the club the chance to reform just last year by renovating the building, and I believe it’s back vibrant again.
Anyway, despite the nostalgia, my mind as usual was occupied by things all things black and amber and I wasn’t going to let the chance fly by to pick Mickey’s intriguing sports brain.
The Dublin hurlers were going well in the league at the time. Tyrone had always been a good league team under Harte and I asked Mickey about his general approach to the competition. “I’d always like to win the league,” he said. “But I wouldn’t like to be winning it going flat out.”
The Dublin hurlers could never afford to be flippant or casual about any competition but I could still relate to what Mickey was talking about. In my third year as Clare manager in 2006, we pulled up a little (so to speak) in the league semi-final against Limerick. It was my last year with Clare. I knew I was walking away at the end of that summer and I wanted absolutely everything focused on the championship.
We could have won in normal time but we were beaten in extra-time. At one stage, it almost looked like both teams were doing everything in their power to lose the match. We had been hammered by Kilkenny in the previous year’s league final. Kilkenny were waiting for the winners that year too. Did we want to risk another hiding, and another setback heading into the championship? I don’t know. All I know is that we definitely didn’t go all out to get to that league final.
Did it do us any good in the long run? We reached another All-Ireland semi-final later that summer, where Kilkenny beat us with a late surge. Yet could we at least have had a league trophy to parade at the end of that year instead of coming up short for the third year in a row?
It would be nice for me to say now that I managed Clare and Dublin to league titles but the league still means different things to different teams at different stages of their development. We never got hung up on the league in Clare when maybe we should have. When Clare finally ended a 38-year wait for a league title last year, it didn’t seem to do the county any favours for the summer.
I just wonder are Waterford happy now after avoiding a relegation dogfight? Derek McGrath was very clear that he wanted certain things out of this league and testing the depth of their panel was one of those targets. Winning the league, even reaching the final for a third year in succession, would confirm that even more. But for a team who have had their foot pressed to the accelerator for the last two and a half seasons, do they really need to keep grinding?
For Micheál Donoghue and Galway though, tomorrow is an ideal opportunity to lay down a marker and go all for a league title. I’d fancy them to have a right rattle at it at this stage. They had a big win in Limerick last Sunday. They showed good character against the breeze in the second half. The defeat to Wexford has still defined their season so far but all those toxins from that defeat will be flushed out of their system if they win tomorrow and go on and win a league title.
The last two teams to win the competition also won promotion to the top tier but I don’t think Micheál will mind another season in 1B if he has a league title to show off. I expect Galway to be hungrier and I fancy them to win.
It is one of the huge problems with the current league system that, that once the serious business of avoiding relegation and gaining promotion is taken care off, intensity can taper off at the quarter-finals. That is just inevitable but when we talk about shadow boxing, I’m sure that will be foremost in Davy Fitzgerald’s mind heading to Nowlan Park tomorrow.
Winning down there would be a fantastic boost to a county craving success but the only match that really matters in Fitzy’s mind will be the Leinster semi-final in Wexford Park on June 10. Wexford still have to beat one of the Leinster qualifier teams first but they should, which would set everything up for the mother of all opportunities.
Will he keep his powder dry or just go for it and unload all he has on Kilkenny? I heard a fella say during the week that Wexford should try and lay down a marker to Kilkenny. I’d love to know what that statement really means when it applies to Kilkenny. Are you going to wound the beast in his own pitch and stir him into a craze for June? Davy certainly won’t want to get a hiding either, which would be fatal to confidence, but I’m sure he’d settle for a solid performance ahead of a win.
wasn’t in Páirc Uí Rinn last weekend but when I watched the highlights on Sunday Sport afterwards, the buzz and excitement in the ground was obvious when Patrick Horgan nailed the winning score with the last play. Cork seem to have got the home crowd really behind them again. With another home game tomorrow against a Limerick side needing to show something after losing to Wexford and Galway in 1B, this could be the match of the weekend.
I expect both to bring a championship type intensity. Listening to John Kiely’s interview after the Galway defeat, he was clearly disappointed and upset. He will need to pick up his players for the challenge but going into the lion’s den away from home is often the easiest way to manage that mindset.
For Cork, this is all about mindset now. After finally putting two good wins, and performances, together, can they make that a sequence? Can they match last Sunday now with the consistency of intensity? If they can, they will prove to themselves, and everybody else, that they have really turned the corner.
If Cork do turn up, I fancy them. Can I trust them to do so? I’m not sure, especially if Limerick bring war down to Páirc Uí Rinn. Still, after Cork’s last two displays, producing anything near that level tomorrow should be good enough.
I remember thinking after Dublin beat Waterford in the relegation final in 2014 that we had got the best game of the weekend in terms of championship-like intensity. Fear does that you, which is why there should be a humdinger in Cusack Park tomorrow.
The Park does hand Clare an advantage, especially with a big crowd expected to show, but Dublin won’t fear the venue either after performing so well there three weeks ago. Dublin could, and probably should, have got something out of that game. With the Cuala lads back now, which is probably a third of the team, they’ll fancy themselves even more.
The conundrum for Ger Cunningham is trying to keep the balance and dynamic right. His team have shown great heart and spirit and togetherness to date so he might not want to tinker too much with the make-up of the side. On the other hand, Ger knows he needs guys like Paul and Mark Schutte, Darragh O’Connell, Cian O’Callaghan and David Treacy, especially their experience, in a game of this magnitude.
Clare will be ready for it though. Any degree of complacency that may have been there when they met Dublin three weeks ago will be long gone now. They also have Tony Kelly back, and Colm Galvin too. David McInerney has got more game-time into him in the meantime.
It’s possible that Clare will be operating at near-championship intensity and Ennis will be rocking even more with the footballers playing Meath beforehand in another important match.
And that luck from winning the coin-toss for venue may just prove decisive.
