False start, frantic finish

SEVENTY minutes old, and already the championship coffers are swelling. Tipperary and Limerick will rejoin their fight for the right to meet Clare in the Munster hurling semi final next Saturday.

Ahead of yesterday’s frantic opening act, questions hung over both Limerick and Tipperary. Seventy-plus minutes of Munster championship action later, we’ve got several more.

Let’s start at the finish. A minute into injury-time, Tipperary somehow found themselves in a position to win this game. Beaten up a stick for most of the first-half, fortunate to be only two points behind at the break, five points in arrears 10 minutes after the restart, they were utterly unable to get any kind of quality ball past a dominant Limerick half-back line.