Will Croke Park have to revert to Plan B on Sunday?

IT didn’t take long last year, just a few minutes after the final whistle and with the masses already breaking onto the sacred sod, before the announcement blared over the Croke Park tannoy system – ‘Gardaí and stewards, to Plan B please, Plan B!’.

Plan A, of course, was to have a very orderly presentation of the Liam MacCarthy Cup to Kilkenny captain Michael Fennelly on a quickly-assembled raised platform in the middle of the pitch, where everyone in the surrounding stands would have almost an equal view of proceedings before the victorious Kilkenny team would undertake a lap of honour, saluting – and being saluted by – the serried ranks of their supporters in the stands and on Hill 16.

Then came the charge of the black-and-amber brigade.