Christy O'Connor: When are Galway finally going to say enough is enough?

Kelly and Butler go into battle again and will Monaghan derail the Derry minor machine.

CHANGING THE TIDE: Galway have lost their last three championship matches to Limerick, can they amend those loses when they go head to head on Saturday. Pic: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

In one of his recent columns in the Irish Times, Joe Canning wrote about Galway’s defeat to Limerick in the 2018 All-Ireland final, especially the lead-in, and how it impacted on their preparations. Galway were favourites but, in Canning’s opinion, they just ran out of gas.

It was their ninth championship match of the summer, including replays in their two previous games, the Leinster final and the All-Ireland semi-final. After three round-robin games in the Leinster championship on successive weekends, and with just seven days between the two draws and the replays, Galway ended up with two weeks to prepare for the All-Ireland final compared to Limerick’s three weeks.