Skipper Curran admits Tipp had to win Munster the hard way

It wasn’t as arduous a campaign as in the famine-ending year of 1987 when they played five games before being crowned Munster champions for the first time since 1971 but it’s still been a hard road for Tipperary this year.

They came through testing games against Limerick and Cork before disposing of Waterford on Sunday to win their 40th Munster senior hurling title.

“We seem to have been getting the tough end of the draw for a few years,” says captain Paul Curran. In 2009 and again in 2011, the last two years that Tipperary won Munster titles, they again had to come the long route, quarter-final/semi-final/final, beating in turn Cork, Clare and Waterford both years.