Colours of summer now clearer

The colour scheme at Croke Park on September 7 this year will consist of saffron and blue and black and amber. Saffron and blue because Clare will be a better team in 2014 than they were in 2013.

Black and amber because Kilkenny will be considerably better in 2014 than they were in 2013. No other colours will be visible because no other county will have improved sufficiently to match these two.

That made you sit up, didn’t it? Relax. Every now and then a columnist is obliged, if not to stir it, then to make his argument in the intro, and beat the reader over the head with it, as opposed to building up to it carefully and waiting till the final couple of paragraphs before giving it both barrels.