Clare braced to put the brakes on Cork momentum

If there’s a message Clare want to get across, it’s that they know their support will be outnumbered on Sunday.

“Cork will bring a massive crowd the next day,” stressed Colm Galvin. His captain Patrick O’Connor expands: “I can already picture the sea of red when we go out and it will probably be three to one Cork. I think it was two to one Cork supporters wise against Waterford.”

Memo to Cork — Clare will have steeled themselves for a game that, as far as they are concerned, may as well be played in Páirc Uí Chaoimh. Their knowledge of their opponents goes beyond 2013 and Dónal Óg Cusack’s understanding of the puckout and his former understudy Anthony Nash, O’Connor having lined out for CIT alongside Lorcán McLoughlin in the 2011 Cork championship when they lost the final to Carrigtwohill.