Munster SHC: Waterford 3-21 Tipperary 1-27
Every draw belongs to someone. With 72 minutes on the clock Tipperary trailed by four points, and given the fixture sequencing, the maths of qualifying from Munster after losing for the second week in a row would have taxed Stephen Hawking. At the final whistle, before he had time to filter his response, Liam Cahill greeted the draw with a chorus line manoeuvre, feet jumping, arms swinging.
It had been a tortuous week for the Tipperary manager. In Tipp’s judicial system there is a surplus of hanging judges and Cahill was guilty not only of producing a gutless performance in the Gaelic Grounds but guilty too of slaughtering his players in public.
On Saturday Cahill trod a line between confession and contrition. “Your emotions go bananas when things go wrong on the big stage in a Tipperary jersey,” said Cahill. “We as a group never intend not to fight or die in our boots on the field. We never intend to do that.
“So we took massive ownership of what happened last weekend. We took massive ownership of that because we had to. We own that for the rest of our lives. I own, maybe, some of my comments in the aftermath. I own that and it weighed heavy. We just draw a line under that now and go forward with this performance.”
For Waterford, there were other emotions. They had this game in the palm of their hands and let it spill; the consequences now will have a ripple effect. A victory for Waterford would have put them on four points, which would have effectively eliminated both Cork and Tipperary, even if Waterford lost their remaining two games on the road.
In that scenario, only one of Cork or Tipp could have reached four points and in the event of a tiebreaker, either of them would have been edged out on account of their head-to-head results against Waterford.
None of that was lost on Davy Fitzgerald, who immediately tried to alter the narrative. “If we get another win [in Ennis or Limerick] we’ll be in the Munster final,” he said. “We’ll be close enough to it, not far away from it. Could we qualify with three points? We could. Is there a chance we mightn’t if we don’t win another game? There is. The best thing this year, compared to last year, no matter what, we’re in the last game with something to fight for.”
On a beautiful evening this was a mesmerising match. Waterford’s nose for goals kept them in front for most of the game, but they couldn’t shake off Tipp’s stubborn challenge, and after their anaemic performance in the Gaelic Grounds, Tipperary were much improved for a course of iron supplements.
Both teams carried a huge threat on their inside forward lines. Mark Kehoe, whose talent has been largely unfulfilled, had his best championship game for Tipp, scoring four points from play and being a constant menace. Jake Morris warmed up too as the game wore on.
At the other end Dessie Hutchinson and Stephen Bennett delivered 2-9, 1-6 of which came from play, and Tipp never really got to grips with them. They combined for a terrific goal, Waterford’s third, early in the second half, just after Tipp had rattled off four unanswered points to take the lead.
A Tipperary player was penalised for lying on the ball in a goalmouth melee, and Tipp manned the goal line in case Hutchinson tried his luck from a 20-metre free. Instead, he saw Bennett unmarked a few metres to his right and gave him the ball with a cute ground stroke; Bennett took a couple of paces and lashed the ball to the net.
The scores were tied for the fifth time immediately from the puck-out, but Waterford kicked on and it took Tipp 24 minutes to bring the sides level again. After that, all hell broke loose. Waterford went on a scoring spree of four points in less than three minutes, two of them from substitute Patrick Curran, to put them 3-20 to 0-25 in front on the stroke of 70 minutes.
Jack Prendergast put them four points clear again two minutes into stoppage time, but Tipp refused to cave in. Seánie Kenneally deftly poked the ball to the net after Morris’s shot had been parried, and in their final attack Tipp conjured an equaliser with the last puck of the game.
Patrick “Bonner” Maher, who made a significant impression off the bench, was involved twice in the build-up before Alan Tynan was fouled 25 metres out. Gearóid O’Connor belted the sliotar high over the bar to end the madness.
WATERFORD: S O’Brien; I Daly, C Prunty, K Bennett (0-1); C Lyons (0-3), T De Búrca, M Fitzgerald; D Lyons (0-1), N Montgomery (0-1); D Hutchinson (0-6, 3f), J Prendergast (1-1), J Barron; Stephen Bennett (2-3, 1-0 pen); M Kiely (0-1), K Mahony.
Subs: J Fagan (0-1) for Prunty (7 mins); Shane Bennett (0-1) for Mahony (50); P Hogan for Montgomery (58); P Curran (0-2) for Stephen Bennett (64).
TIPPERARY: B Hogan; C Barrett, M Breen (0-1), C Morgan; C Bowe, R Maher (0-2, 1f), B O’Mara; E Connolly (0-2), A Tynan (0-2); G O’Connor (0-4, 3f), N McGrath (0-2), J Forde (0-3, 2f); D Stakelum (0-1), M Kehoe (0-4), J Morris (0-3).
Subs: P Maher (0-1) for Forde (51 mins); W Connors for Connolly (54); J McGrath (0-1) for N McGrath (55); S Kenneally (1-1) for Stakelum (58); D McCormack for O’Mara (68).
Referee: James Owens (Wexford).
