Wary Tyrrell determined to avoid Leinster heartache again

IMAGINE this scenario. A team with little realistic chance of defeating Kilkenny “tears” into them from the start but runs out of steam in the second half and is powerless to stop the scores mounting up.

It’s not fantasy, it’s the way Jackie Tyrrell, Kilkenny’s All-Ireland winning captain in 2006, recalls the Cats’ recent game against Offaly in the semi-final of the Leinster hurling championship.

These are his exact words, ahead of next Sunday’s Leinster final in Croke Park against Wexford. “In the first 35 minutes they tore into us. They were really hitting hard. But it’s hard to keep that up for 70 minutes and — like the year previous — they kind of died off in the second half and we just kept tipping over the scores and eventually pulled away.’’