Cruise Control

KILKENNY v Tipperary, Cork v Wexford, August 10 and 17.

No bean-counter at Croke Park will ever admit it, but you can bet the house, the wife and the offspring that this was the final four the GAA had in mind when they introduced the All-Ireland qualifier back-door system.

All it required was yesterday's quarter-final formalities. Did we say formalities? Apologies to the brave men of Antrim, because where the even braver bookies of this island were offering 6/1 against the men from the north upsetting Wexford yesterday, they put up the fight of fights.

Dinny Cahill's heroes almost made themselves the story of the summer. Indeed, they should have been two goals up after a quarter of an hour, and would have but for

(a) a very harsh umpiring decision that denied Liam Watson what looked a perfect three-pointer, and (b) the width of a post, denying the same player just minutes later, when he beat Wexford's brilliant keeper Damien Fitzhenry with a superb double off the air of a Ciaran Herron high delivery only to see it rebound off the upright, for a 65.

Towards the end of the first half, justice was seen to be done for Antrim, their continued assaults on their vaunted opponents rewarded with a couple of fortuitous goals.

Reward alright enough to see them 2-5 to 0-6 in front at the break but not final reward. That was to come the way of Wexford, who did unto Antrim what they had already done to both Offaly, in the Leinster semi-final, and to Limerick last time out, in the All-Ireland qualifier series.

They scrapped, stayed in touch, and ultimately were standing at the final bell. But how Antrim will be cursing those two missed opportunities early on, how they will curse even more when they look at the frees conceded near the end, the frees from which the lethal Paul Codd ended their dreams for 2003.

Though they came up short, let no-one patronise them.

This is one seriously talented side, and in centre-back Mark McKeegan, even on a day of many outstanding individual performances from hurlers in both games, they had the best player on view.

Anyway, Antrim don't get to spoil the perfect semi-final party, though they brought great gulps of fresh air to headquarters, and also brought new energy to a rapidly-suffocating hurling scene that yesterday witnessed the burn-off of yet another of the new-age teams.

Clare, Limerick, Waterford, Galway; all blown away already. Yesterday it was the turn of Offaly. Sad it was to see. Tipperary manager Michael Doyle was generous to the midlanders afterwards, but it sounded hollow. "They gave us enough of it in the end, I was happy to hear the final whistle. We got the breaks at the end of the first half, a goal then, a goal again just after half-time. Those were probably the telling factors, we had a buffer and it's like anything else, when you're playing catch-up, things seem to always run for the team ahead. We're happy enough, we knew Offaly would give us a tough game, and that's what we got. We're relieved."

Why wouldn't they, after where they were just a couple of months ago, following a first-round Munster championship hammering by Clare. In truth however, if any winning manager could ever really speak honestly after a game such as this, what Michael would have been saying was that Offaly were not good, that try as they might, once those goals went in, the air went out of their challenge, and the five-point margin at the end should have been fifteen.

Tipperary and Wexford advance, but the real winners yesterday were the GAA's coffers. The real loser? Hurling.

Ultimately, the second chance was always going to help the strong, and after a few years of losing stature, the giants are all back.

Asked if, after the loss to Clare, he would have seen this day coming an All-Ireland semi-final against Kilkenny Michael Doyle responded: "Don't mind me thinking it, did ye ever think it?"

Well, yes actually, Michael. I mean, who in their right mind would have written off Tipperary? All-Ireland champions of 2001, gave Kilkenny the best game of the year last year, pipped by the same team for this year's National League title. You dismiss that team?

No, that day, that game against Clare, that was an aberration. "We call that Nightmare in Pairc Uí Chaoimh," said Doyle. "We were dire that day, no doubt about it. Right, we've come back, but I don't think we've hurled the way we're capable of hurling yet. I hope we'll see it the next day. We have a lot of work to do, showed out there today, we have an awful lot of work to do. We're not sticking our heads in the sand, we know we have an awful lot of work to do, but we're happy to be there."

They're not the only ones, and certainly there are two great semi-finals in prospect. But there are losers in all this too, bigger losers than just Antrim and Offaly. Even as the cash is being counted on August 10, August 17, let's hope someone remembers that.