Strange kind of hurling rivalry between Offaly and Galway passes test of time

Leinster SHC semi-final: Galway v Offaly, 2pm ... The emergence of Offaly and Galway as hurling powers in the late 70s had a considerable element of interdependence.

Though the national landscape was dominated by Cork and Kilkenny at the time, results in the National League throughout the decade suggested that neither Galway nor Offaly were too far off the mark, and so it proved in 1980 and then 1981 when first the Tribesmen and then the Faithful County made their respective breakthroughs.

The frontier between the two bordering counties is narrow, but the closeness of the relationship was never more obvious than in the All-Ireland final of 1981 between them when Seán Silke of Meelick-Eyrecourt marked Brendan Birmingham of Lusmagh.