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Are the old firm a thing of the past in Hurling now? Cork going 15 years without a title. KK looking like they could break a new famine record of their own soon. Tipp to be fair wont be too far away if they can freshen up things with prospective young players. Even if Limerick win 2 or 3 in a row its not a bad thing for hurling.

Limerick haven't done 2 in a row yet but They were awesome today, But teams need to analyse them and come up with a plan to stop them. Like closing down the space they seem to make so easily for themselves.

Another year where the old firm lose out.

Cork are still poor
KK are not good enough
Tipp will probably have to rebuild

Happy Days

Is there's any danger that fans (small amount) be at Croke for the finals?

Surely they will at least consider letting the families of the players in to watch the final.

I am a rare hurling fan around here, I find both his podcasts quite good and for a man that doesn't call himself a hurling person he is very knowledgeable in the players and the history of the players and teams setup in particular. He is no doubt a clever bloke but sometimes though his mouth is too big for his own good.

football better than hurling this year as hurling not  single elimination knockout

The best thing is I was able to read the Indo yesterday while watching Cork and Kerry and didnt miss a thing.

Tipp and Cork beaten in Munster and Kilkenny brought to a point by Dublin. It wasnt long since that would have been seen as a major shakeup in the hurling championship. Times they are a changing.

He did and rightly so. Its very difficult for refs to see what we can see on HD tv and expect him to know the difference between a ball that leaves the hand for 2mm before being palmed or a throw. Change it so that the ball must go from hurl to handpass or from one hand to the other hand for the pass. Problem solved and looks alot better too.

And I agree aswell. Sure this weekend could be completely different especially given the weather forecast,  but in general over the last few years theres been alot of teams playing the quick ball to the free man and then shoot for score. For that we get high scores and in some cases at the same time lot of wides aswell. Limerick and Galway appear to do this the most IMO.

Johnny. I think it would be a dis service to all the players who ever played hurling for a team to get fit enough to play a handpassing game. The day that happens we can safely say Hurling has followed Football all the way to the slurry pit.

https://twitter.com/sixtwofourtwo/status/1320011916677386240/photo/1

Yes I have a bee in my bonnet over handpassing. See the link above. Laois are handpassing almost half of their passes. I watched highlights of the Westmeath County final and the amount of handpassing was shocking. If this the way the game is going there will be no intensity to the game whatsoever and the game will just become handpass to the man in space and shoot from distance.

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Changing the composite of the ball to be more dense? Would that make the ball travel less?

The hand pass is in the rules, changing it will create bigger and longer rucks IMO as the ball will be unable to be released quicker and the player will have to drop the ball, that'll create a ruck of players trying to gain possession. which is ugly enough at times, a good old fashion pull on the ball is not the done thing anymore as it gives away possession.

Clare hit 23 points 10 from play and 13 from frees and hit 6 wides

Limerick hit 36 points 26 from play (which is huge but more telling on how Clare defended IMO) 10 from frees and 11 wides
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On the contrary, the rucks are being caused because of the frenzy to get the ball into the hand....Once its in the hand then the pop handpass out ends the ruck. If you couldn't handpass the ball out of a ruck there probably wouldn't be a ruck in the first place as players would be better off scooping it out or playing it along the ground out of a ruck as they used to do before.

Its a good topic and becomes more apparent when teams rack up huge scores as limerick did. The hurl bos has changed for sure, the players are more athletic and the ball is probably less prone to moisture. All this making it easier to score. But the handpass has also been perfected now more than ever before and used alot more than in the past and Limerick use it to great effect. The pop pass out to a man in space is very prevalent in todays game but can become a bit boring to watch over and over again. The problem as I see it is its very difficult for the opposition to intercept a handpass. Unlike a stick pass you cant block it or hook it with the hurl. In fact there is very little a player can do to stop a handpass in hurling. Instead they swarm the player in possession which then has many other consequences... More spare hand fouls, more rucks and ultimately easier scores for the player now in space. I would love to see the handpass either been reduce to 1 or none or change to make it more difficult. The ball will stay in play longer and the game becomes less start stop.
Leave the ball alone and yellow is fine too.

If the ball is being popped out of a ruck to space then it's speeding up the game, one man tackle is plenty, mark the space where the hand pass is going to. You can block a hand pass with your hurl, no foul there.

If we apply the rules properly on the hand pass then it's more difficult to complete within the rules, I thought there was a good few calls on Sunday by the ref for improper hand passes..

The O'Connor lads from Cork were into the new design of the bigger boss, that was over 20 odd years ago, there was then regulations came in on size of boss, stick sizes would have been generally a 36/38 that's dropped to a 35 mainly, Joe Deane being the main player I seen with a low handling of the hurl.

Hurling is fine, teams all weekend (undr20's) were looking 30 or 40 yard passes into space, teams will adapt to that, like they did to Corks running game when they were on top.

In five years there'll be a new tactic.. Kilkenny played the traditional way, ball into forwards and let them win their own ball, served them well for many a year.

Speeding up the game should not be the be all and end all. If the game gets any faster there will be a score every minute. What Im suggesting will keep the ball in play for longer but not necessarily slow the game down. Blocking Hand passes is very very rare. I dont buy the 'game is fine and leave it alone' either. Every game needs at least a discussion.

Its a good topic and becomes more apparent when teams rack up huge scores as limerick did. The hurl bos has changed for sure, the players are more athletic and the ball is probably less prone to moisture. All this making it easier to score. But the handpass has also been perfected now more than ever before and used alot more than in the past and Limerick use it to great effect. The pop pass out to a man in space is very prevalent in todays game but can become a bit boring to watch over and over again. The problem as I see it is its very difficult for the opposition to intercept a handpass. Unlike a stick pass you cant block it or hook it with the hurl. In fact there is very little a player can do to stop a handpass in hurling. Instead they swarm the player in possession which then has many other consequences... More spare hand fouls, more rucks and ultimately easier scores for the player now in space. I would love to see the handpass either been reduce to 1 or none or change to make it more difficult. The ball will stay in play longer and the game becomes less start stop.
Leave the ball alone and yellow is fine too.

If the GAA got the championship up and running now the sports would get priceless global attention. Hurling is far more interesting than the Bundesliga.

Hurling doesn't even get attention in most of Ireland.

It's  better than the bogball/basketball game that used to be football, before they changed the rules about a thousand times, still making a Horlicks of it and dominated by one team for past ten years 

I wonder what rules they'll bring in next

The top level of Gaelic football as played now is a better spectacle than it has ever been.

I love hurling but the fact is that interest in it is very esoteric in this country, and that's the way a lot of "hurling people" (let's face it, to be accepted as a hurling person you have to be a man - the clique of hurling men, great hurling men, true hurling men etc.) like it.

2019 saved by a replay after a man was sent off in final. Kerry Donegal being an excpetion
2018 Super 8's saved by a last minute goal by Kerry from being a complete flop
2017 One decent game. The final

Top level football ie:super 8's has not been a great spectacle. Mediocre at best. There were well over 60 championship games each year since the beginning of the super 8's and just a handfull of great spectacles. Not a great return IMO

The best games of Gaelic football over the last seven or eight years have been the best games in the history of the sport.

People continually mistake the general level of competitiveness between teams, which has declined, with general standard, which has gone far up.

Games between Dublin, Mayo, Kerry and occasionally Donegal, Monaghan and Tyrone over the last eight years have been compelling spectacles and exhibitions of quality.

Just because top teams have managed to put together hundreds of slick hand passes without error does not necessarily mean the standard has got better. You are not the first to confuse hype with quality in Gaelic football.