Ryan says Munster title high on Banner’s wish list

You can talk all you like to Clare’s Colin Ryan about the possibility of meeting neighbours Limerick (the county where he earns his crust as a teacher in Pallaskenry) in the Munster final on July 13, a possibility already being discussed in many a hostelry in both counties.

Just don’t expect a response.

For Ryan at the moment, there’s the little matter of a semi-final hurdle to be negotiated first on Sunday in Thurles, a repeat of last year’s All-Ireland final against Cork.

Not that Colin doesn’t have an eye on a Munster final, a burning desire to win a provincial medal. “I think it’s an incentive for anybody to have a Munster championship medal, but you can’t win a Munster championship final without winning a Munster championship semi-final. We’re not concerned with the Munster final yet – obviously it would be a great goal and something we probably set at the start of the year, that we’d like to win it. But you’d like to win it every year.

“From my experience we’ve had an awful tough time in Munster championship. Since I’ve been there (debut in 2009) we didn’t win a whole pile of games and last year was my first time winning in a long, long time (Clare beat Waterford in the quarter-final before losing to Cork).

“I’d be hoping that we could get over Sunday – all going well – and only then will we concentrate on winning a Munster final.”

They are already champions of course, and the achievement of last September, the win over Cork in the All-Ireland final replay, is something that is theirs forever.

For many a hurler — and from outside the big three especially — that would be a great craving sated. For Colin and his young teammates, however, it’s merely appetite whetted.

“We’re not trying to hold onto it, we’re trying to go and actually grab it again.

“Having gone through it last year and knowing we have the right stuff, the right panel, the right players, the right backroom team behind us — it’s very good to know that coming into this year.

“We know we’re able to compete at that level and that’s what we wanted to make sure of in the league this year, that we still were at that level and that we would carry that through to this year as well. There are so many things to be brought forward from last year but there’s plenty we can improve on too because we’re there to be knocked now.

“Everybody’s going to want to do that. We have to make sure we stay ahead of the game. It was brilliant for so many reasons but we want to sample that again and make sure we get to that stage again.”

As to which is the bigger prize, reaching a Munster final or the automatic All-Ireland quarter-final berth that goes with it? Probably the latter. “It kind of sets your year up. You know you’ll be hurling into August if you win next Sunday. Winning is going to be brilliant any time you do it and it’s going to have its advantages. And it should have its advantages. So we’ll be looking forward to that hopefully, if that does happen. If not, we know how the All-Ireland qualifiers route goes so we’ll be able to deal with that too if it comes our way.”