Loughnane's Clare, Ring, Armagh's breakthrough: the biggest draws in Gaelic games

As the full-house signs go up all over Munster, Kieran Shannon in a two-part series delved the history books and crunched the numbers to see who previously has had claim to be the biggest draw and hottest ticket in the game.

Christy Ring in 1963. ‘I played on a Cork team that was winning. That was the break I got,’ he said.

A few months into his tenure as Cork manager Donal O’Grady made the remark to his players that the new Croke Park had been made for the Cork hurlers just as the Cork hurlers were made for the new Croke Park.

The previous 2002 season which had been such a challenging one for them – three tepid defeats in Thurles prompting an off-season strike – had also seen the new Hogan Stand unveiled in all its glory, and with it, the capacity of the ground increase to 80,000 – 18,000 more than had attended the team’s All Ireland win in 1999.