The players are devastated, admits Barry

ON DAYS such as this, you tread reluctantly to the losers’ dressing-room door.

Babs emerges, heads down the corridor to say the traditional few words of congratulation to the opposition, has to battle his way through the celebrating Limerick fans, who have managed to crowd into the narrow confines before a couple of Gardaí get the gates closed, suffer the banter.

When he returns — and most unusually for this plain-spoken and most media-friendly of managers — he has nothing to say, not to us at any rate. Undoubtedly, however, he will have had something to say to his players, and it will surely all have been positive. How could it be otherwise, when they had given their all in what have been three titanic battles with Limerick?

Certainly that was the thinking of Tipp selector Tom Barry, the one eventually chosen to meet the pack (“I drew the short straw,” he quipped.)

“The players are devastated, shattered after their exertions. But we’re very proud of them, proud of them as a bunch of amateurs, the way they kept at it. It’s a credit to both teams, the entertainment they served up today. We’re after playing in an epic three games, and to lose the way we did — very, very disappointing.’’

Any complaints, he’s asked? “No, no complaints, it was a hard and honest game, fought tooth and nail; the small things decided it.”

Small things, and not-so-small things perhaps, like the refereeing, for instance. In the first-half it was the Limerick fans incensed with Seanie McMahon, for the goal particularly when he allowed play to proceed even after man-of-the-match Mark Foley had been fouled and felled, no free awarded; thereafter, however, going by the fan reaction, it was Tipperary feeling aggrieved. What of Tom’s view? “Look, it makes good sense that we let the reporters talk about the referee,” he said, but there were obvious invitations in the tone. “We’ll talk about our team, about getting them ready, okay?”

That’s going to be a major challenge for this management group. Tipp now join Cork, Dublin and Offaly in a four-team qualifying group, three games in as many weekends, two teams to emerge for the All-Ireland quarter-finals. That’s six championship games in six weeks for Tipperary, an unprecedented situation.

First up, Offaly in Thurles next Saturday; six days for the players to try and put the disappointment behind them. “I think anybody can imagine how difficult it’s going to be, having played three weeks in a row, two bouts of extra-time. We’ll regroup, we’ll recover, we’ll use all the therapies we can find to heal the wounds, get them back. The big job then, obviously, is mentally, to get us refocused. One win will get us back on the road but Offaly will be a huge challenge. They’re an improving team, we saw how well they did against Kilkenny; we’d have the height of respect for them. We’ll be meeting tomorrow evening, light training then on Wednesday evening, then meet early on Saturday.”

The loss was a body-blow, no question, and with midfielder Shane McGrath and Willie Ryan suffering knocks (McGrath was a major loss from midfield, gone from the 55th minute), Paul Kelly still definitely out, Tipp are facing a worrying six days. Surely, however, they’ll be focusing on the positives — Conor O’Mahony getting to grips with Ollie Moran, Declan Fanning continuing to fill in well at full-back, Diarmuid Fitzgerald and Eamonn Buckley also impressive in the corners, young keeper Gerry Kennedy making a few good saves, most notably in extra-time.

“Conor did very well,” Tom agrees; “To restrict Ollie to two points (three) was a fair achievement, but there were several heroic performances. We couldn’t say a word about lack of effort in terms of what we got from our players. We’re very proud of them, they gave everything asked of them but unfortunately someone had to lose.

“The games have to bring us on, we had about eight guys today playing either their first or second season, so to play three tough championship games is a huge value to the likes of Pa Bourke, Thomas Stapleton, even Seamus Butler — he’s older but has very little championship hurling under his belt. We’d be hoping this will stand to them.”