Clare hitting their stride with marathon tape in sight

CLARE 0-26 LIMERICK 0-15: Sometime before the final whistle here, neutrals’ attentions turned to the more dramatic developments in Thurles but the more Clare supporters see of this team of theirs, the more they are convinced of their virtues.

A third straight win was achieved with much less fuss than that epic against Tipperary seven days previous. Any fears that their endeavours there may have stretched them on this occasion were allayed in the closing stages as they ran clear of Limerick.

Co-manager Gerry O’Connor put that finish down to their fitness levels when it was their downfall in 2017. “Look, it’s a credit to our conditioning team that Kelvin Harold is leading that our guys finished as strongly as they did. That’s three games that we’ve finished incredibly strong in. They looked as if they could keep going for another half an hour. We’ve worked really, really hard on our recovery and on our fitness banks over the last six months and that clearly showed out there today.