Galway vs Waterford

[deiseach]

Déiseach

The other day I came across the famous photo of Eoin Kelly being congratulated by his girlfriend in a non traditional fashion after the 2008 semifinal while their son wandered off with a hurl in his hands and was wondering what happened to Waherford in 2009. How come it was Tipp that made the next step  upwards ?

I think so much of  GAA success is psychological and it's a real pity to see Tipp there instead of your crowd.

The harsh truth for Waterford is that reaching the 2008 final was an outlier. We haven't been good enough to win the All-Ireland, Tipperary have. With a bit of luck we might have won it somewhere along the line. But a truly worthy team would not worry about luck over the long run. Tipperary were unlucky in 2009 but they dusted themselves off and came back better the following year, beating Kilkenny in the final by more than they beat us in the semi-final. It may sound defeatist, but I don't view the last decade or so as being a failure. We've had riches beyond my wildest dreams. Let me put it like this. I don't look at Clare and Wexford and their successes in the 1990's and wish I could swap

[ormondeboy]

But we'll take '87 as a corner turned of sorts for Tipperary hurling. Since then: Senior All-Irelands (4), Munster (9), NHL (5). u21 All-Irelands (3), Munster (9), Minor All-Irelands (3) Munster (9) and 60 odd All-Stars.

How convenient. Go back a mere seven years and you'll see Offaly have won as many Senior All-Ireland's and provincial championship as Tipperary in that time. Galway have only won three Senior All-Ireland's but they have won no fewer than nine Under-21 and eight Minor All-Ireland's. So if your point is that Tipperary are part of the 'Big 2' if you exclude all the bad days for Tipperary and exclude the good days for everyone else then yeah, you're right

How convenient is right. You can make it a Big 5 if you want and throw in Galway and Offally. f**k it don't stop at 1980; you can split the years All-Irelands have been played played for and won, into two periods (say 124 years from 1887) and look at the most recent period say from 1949 and we have won 13 All Irelands, 9 u21 and 13 minor and 18 NHL.

Or you could take the most recent 25 years and go back to 1986. You could look at the history of d'Association and go the whole hog over the 124 years. I don't really mind. Stats are convenient all right.

To be honest the 40 year red herring is thrown out to diminish a hurling tradition that is still chugging along and playing some of the most exhilerating hurling ever seen. We'll take it. Ye can have Davy. So ye can.