‘Respect us, because we’re not going away’

The before. TJ Ryan speaking to RTE prior to throw-in: "We’ll definitely put in a hell of a performance... we have had no injuries. No excuses."

The after. Declan Hannon on Twitter: “Enjoyed that one! Onwards and upwards, no one trick ponies anymore! #Believe”

In this bout of the disrespected, it turned out Limerick were the most outraged. Tipperary’s disappointment at how they were perceived both in and outside the county after last year’s early Championship exit and the dismal middle period of the league may just have been offset somewhat by how good they were here in the league final last month.

But Limerick’s fury ran unabated.

From their paralysing nerves in last August’s All-Ireland semi-final to another fruitless spring to Donal O’Grady’s departure, the distance between them and that blissful July afternoon on the Ennis Road was growing further and further.

The week before last, Paul Browne spoke of how he felt some people wanted Limerick to disappear.

Yesterday they said hello again.

“Yeah, this proves it’s not going to happen,” he said. “Look, you try to keep away from the papers but inevitably you hear things through the grapevine.

“We had heard all that stuff and to be honest we were disgusted with it ourselves. We just wanted to prove to everyone, to the hurling nation, that we’re not going away.”

Just how frustrating was it for the players?

“Extremely annoying if you ask any man inside in that dressing room. A huge driving factor today was the media and what’s been said and the disrespect that’s been shown to us.

“Just the media in general. And even our own public in Limerick. Some people are all about you and others want to see you knocked down.

“We are the Munster champions. We’re not giving up that crown without a massive fight. And we proved that out there.”

Tipperary may have played a little into their hands by making three positional switches to compensate for the arrival of Lar Corbett.

Then again, the ever-enigmatic Seamus Callanan could have put Tipperary further in the driving seat had he not fluffed a shot with only Nickie Quaid to beat in the 49th minute — Richie McCarthy, mind you, had a say in putting him off slightly.

Yet Limerick, having had so much of the initiative, lost their lead in the 47th minute, only regaining it when it mattered most in injury-time.

Only their players and their “die hards”, as Shane Dowling referred to them on Twitter after the game, would have considered such an epic finish on par with last season’s fixture.

“Not to be harping back to it, but this goes back to two years again when they caught us in the last 10 minutes,” said Browne. “We vowed that they’d never do it again and last year it happened and this year it happened again.

“We know the strength in character inside in the dressing room and there was no chance we were going to let it slip when we were that close to it with 15 minutes to go.

“We always knew we were fitter and stronger and we’d drive on. We had everything in the tank we needed to drive on and we proved that.”

Six weeks until a Munster final against one of Clare, Cork or Waterford, expectation will suddenly return to Limerick like a prodigal son.

Browne insists the reunion won’t be a happy one after what happened against Clare last August.

“I suppose we didn’t let the hype or anything like that affect us the last day (2013 Munster final v Cork). We’re going to be the same this time. We’ve learnt our lessons from last year’s semi-final.

“Hype is hype, it’s not for us, it’s for the supporters and I don’t think it’ll be an issue or anything like that regardless of who we end up playing.

That may be true but Ryan, summing up, gave away Limerick’s true intentions. “As far as I’m concerned we’ve three more. Today was day one, it’s been a good day and a good night for Limerick.”