The All Ireland weekend has finally reached us and everyone’s looking forward to a novel pairing. 31 counties are probably rooting for Limerick, hoping that the Cats stranglehold can be broken. Can it be done? It’s possible but unlikely.

Limerick have been improving all year but question marks surround them still, Tipperary should have beaten them twice, Waterford did beat them, then everyone thinks they caught Waterford on a bad day second time round. Irrespective of that they’re in the final and they’ve got some top quality players and a powerful spine of a team. It’s that powerful backbone, Stephen Lucey, Brian Geary, Ollie Moran and Brian Begley that could help them upset the cats. No doubt Limerick will get stuck in and mix it up trying to unsettle Kilkenny from the start. If the full forward line can then produce a few more goals then we certainly could see a Limerick win.

Aside from the Galway game Kilkenny have been relatively untested all year but they’ve been impressive in what they’ve done. Shefflin is having another top class year, posting huge scores. Martin Comerford is as reliable as ever and one or other of the rest of the forwards seems to have a great game every time they play. They’ll be looking for their full back line to tie down Limerick’s danger line but more importanly it’s their half back line that they’ll be looking to dominate. That’s where it all stems from for Kilkenny, if Tommy Walsh and JJ Delaney get up a head of steam on the wings and Brian Hogan can man the centre then there’ll be endless ball going forward to the cats attack and little ball getting through to the Limerick full forwards.

Predictions? I’m going for a Kilkenny win and a score of 2-18 to 1-15.

Limerick have named the same starting 15 from their semi-final victory for Sunday’s final. The team is:

B Murray; D Reale, S Lucey, S Hickey; P Lawlor, B Geary, M Foley; S O’Grady, M O’Brien; M Fitzgerald, O Moran, S O’Connor; A O’Shaughnessy, B Begley D Ryan.

Kilkenny are clear favourites to retain the Liam MacCarthy cup on Sunday. Their typical price in the betting shops is 1-4 while Limerick are around 10-3 and the draw is 11-1. A winning margin of anything from 1 to 9 points is available at around 5-2, indeed the cats to win by 16 or more is on offer around 11-1. Clearly the bookies don’t give Limerick any chance.

In the minor game, the champions Tipperary are slight favourites at 4-6 over Cork at 6-4 with the draw around 15-2.

Laois beat Meath by 1-15 to 1-9 in Leixlip today to win the camogie junior B All Ireland and claim the Nancy Murray cup. It was a real game of two halves, Meath led by 1-9 to 0-3 at half time and then Laois stormed back to score 1-12 without reply in the second half. Captain Denise Quigley raised the cup and midfielder Louise Mahony was named player of the game.

.

More heartbreak for Waterford last night as Wexford beat them by 2 points, 1-11 to 1-9, to win the intermediate all ireland title. A late goal from Ciaran Lyng proved the crucial score. Read a report on Hoganstand.

Galway beat Cork by 4-21 to 2-18 after extra time in the all Ireland under 21 semi final. The game finished level at 2-16 each at the end of normal time but Galway powered away in the extra period driven by the scoring of Kerril Wade and Joe Canning and the spectacular goalkeeping of James Skehill. Read the RTE sport report here.

I’ve closed the hurler of the year poll and replaced it with a simple who’ll win the all-ireland one. With over a hundred votes cast the final results were Dan Shanahan 54%, Andrew O’Shaughnessy 30%, Henry Shefflin 6%, Ken McGrath 5%, Ollie Moran 2% and 4% for others. The All Ireland will probably have a big bearing on the outcome, if O’Shaughnessy has another big game that should put him in poll position, if Shefflin dominates then he might sneak in and win it again, if neither of them perform then Dan might hold on to it

Martin Breheny, arguably the best GAA journalist currently, had a great article in last Saturday’s Irish Independent which I can no longer find on their website so I’m putting some of it here. The main gist of it was that current players have raised the level of hurling to an all-time high and then looking at players from different eras and trying to compare them. The most interesting part was where he listed 5 teams, the best of the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and 00s.

His best 15 of this current decade was:

Damien Fitzhenry; Noel Hickey, Diarmuid O’Sullivan, Ollie Canning; Tommy Walsh, Ken McGrath, Sean Og O’hAilpin; Derek Lyng, Jerry O’Connor; Martin Comerford, Henry Shefflin, Ben O’Connor; Eoin Kelly, Dan Shanahan, Joe Deane;

I’m sure everyone would have their own personal preferences but generally you can’t quibble with that line-up, it’s a very strong one.

Going back through the decades then we have:

60’s: Ollie Walsh (KK); John Doyle (Tip), Austin Flynn (Wat), Tom Neville (Wex); Seamus Cleere (KK), Tony Wall (Tip), Mick Roche (Tip); Theo English (Tip), Paddy Moran (KK); Jimmy Doyle (Tip), Leam Devaney (Tip), Babs Keating (Tip); Donie Nealon (Tip), Christy Ring (Cor), Tommy Walsh (KK);

70’s: Noel Skehan (KK); Fan Larkin (KK), Pat Hartigan (Lim), John Horgan (Cork); Mick Jacob (Wex), Pat Henderson (KK), John Connolly (Gal); Joe McKenna (Lim), Ray Cummins (Cor), Eddie Keher (KK); Martin Quigley (Wex), Tony Doran (Wex), Eamon Cregan (Lim);

80’s: Ger Cunningham (Cor); Joe Hennessy (KK), Conor Hayes (Gal), Sylvie Linnane (Gal); Pete Finnerty (Gal), Ger Henderson (KK), Ger Coughlan (Off); John Fenton (Cor), Steve Mahon (Gal); Nicky English (Tip), Joe Cooney (Gal), Tony O’Sullivan (Cor); Jimmy Barry-Murphy (Cor), Liam Fennelly (KK), Seanie O’Leary (Cor);

90’s: Davy Fitzgerald (Cla); Brian Corcoran (Cor), Brian Lohan (Cla), Martin Hanamy (Off); Brian Whelehan (Off), Seanie McMahon (Cla), Anthony Daly (Cla); Tommy Dunne (Tip), Ciaran Carey (Lim); Jamsie O’Connor (Cla), Gary Kirby (Lim), Martin Storey (Wex); Pat Fox (Tip), DJ Carey (KK), Michael Cleary (Tip);

Looking at those the 70s team seems the most powerful of the lot although 1-7 on the 90s team and 10-15 on the current team look like they’d be more than a match for anyone.

Been a bit slow on the updates this past week due to a change of job, but there hasn’t been too much happening as we await the All-Ireland.

Congrats to the Dubs under 21 team on making the final, should generate big interest in the final which is due for September 9th. Cork and Galway clash this Saturday in Thurles to decide the other final place.

Waterford get a chance to help overcome some of their despair when they contest the intermediate final with Wexford in Kilkenny on Saturday. The intermediate grade mighn’t make many headlines or garner much interest but an All-Ireland is still an All-Ireland.

PJ Ryan the Kilkenny keeper still feels he has a shot at making the final despite the broken bone in his arm. I’m sure Brian Cody will give him all the time he needs but equally if he feels he has a capable backup in James McGarry (if he’s still playing?) or Richie O’Neill then I’m sure he’ll have no concerns making the switch. Noel Hickey is also reportedly back in training as he tries to overcome a hamstring injury, despite their strong squad the cats will definitely be looking for Hickey to make it to help contain the threat of big full forward Brian Begley.

Kicking off the All Ireland build-up we can have a quick look back at Limerick’s last All-Ireland final apperance which was in 1996 when Wexford beat them thanks to Tom Dempsey’s goal, 1-13 to 0-14. I was at that game and just came across the programme from it so here’s the Limerick team sheet from that day.

Mark Foley is amazingly still flying at wing back 11 years later and Barry Foley is also still on the panel having been at wing forward that day.

Interestingly in the mini sevens that day was a certain James Fitzpatrick from Ballyhale in Kilkenny… sound familiar? Have a look at the list here and you’ll see there’s a couple of other familar names there too, including Declan Coulter from Armagh who played in the Nicky Rackard final on Saturday last.

« Previous entries