Fundamental Déise deficiencies finally come home to root
Even before the dust had settled on the wreckage of Waterford's All-Ireland aspirations, the myth-makers had gone into overdrive.
Limerick, they said,tore into Waterford from the throw-in and never gave them any time or space in which to weave their magic. Waterford, they said, were flat after their two tough games against Cork in the previous fortnight. It wasn't fair, they said, that Waterford were given such a difficult passage through their side of the draw while Kilkenny were able to amble into the final past a series of mediocre opponents.
In other words, blame everyone else except Waterford. The fact is that Waterford are probably the fittest team playing hurling today, as indicated by the late surges which typified virtually all of their games this year up to the semi-final. Even in the latter game, they were still creating goal chances right up to the final whistle. It may be that they were not as psychologically "up" for the game as they needed to be, as suggested by their high fumble and wide counts. But they hit a similar number of wides in the first game against Cork when psychological motivation was hardly a problem.
It may be that Waterford were mentally exhausted after the big effort they put into the Cork games, or that they did not treat Limerick with the respect they deserved. But the fact remains that, apart from the ten-minute spell in the first half, Waterford dominated this game territorially and had enough possession to win comfortably. The idea that Limerick tore into Waterford from the outset is not true. There was nothing between the teams in a rather lame first ten minutes, after which Limerick were leading by two points (1-1 to 0-2) thanks to Donie Ryan's opportunist goal. Limerick then hit their purple patch which saw them leading 2-6 to 0-3 after 20 minutes.
After that, Waterford dominated the game territorially, especially in the second half. At half-time, Limerick had played the ball 84 times to effect in open play compared to 76 for Waterford. In the second half, the play count was in Waterford's favour 85/62, giving an overall total in favour of the Déise of 161/146. True, Limerick worked very hard to deny Waterford space and time, and got in an admirable number of blocks and hooks. But the real reasons for their victory lie elsewhere.
First of all, they lie in Waterford's horrendous wides total of 17 compared with Limerick's eight. This happens to teams who are chasing the game, and inclined to put an extra strain into their swing in their desperation to score. A second key reason for Waterford's defeat was their inability to eliminate a basic defensive frailty which has threatened disaster all summer. In the Munster championship games against Cork and Limerick, Waterford fullback Declan Prendergast went up with his hand to try to catch high incoming balls and ended up conceding goals - to Fraggy Murphy's well-timed catch against Cork and to Brian Begley's overhead pull against Limerick in the Munster final.
Declan Prendergast is big, but he is not a physical player. Unlike his brother Seamus, he has no reputation as a good fielder of the high ball. Yet, three times against Limerick he tried to outfield Brian Begley, a bigger and taller man with an imposing reputation as a fielder. The outcome was three goals for Limerick, the first when Begley's touch on was seized upon by Donie Ryan in the early minutes of the game, the second when Begley was brought down for a penalty having outfielded Prendergast, and the third when Begley did the job himself having again got the better of the Waterford Number Three.
By contrast, Waterford's big fielders Seamus Prendergast and Dan Shanahan failed to fetch even one of the stream of high balls sent into the Limerick goal area during the course of the game. The reason is simple: not only are Brian Geary and Stephen Lucey much more physical players than Declan Prendergast, but they never once tried to catch the ball. Instead, they concentrated on preventing their opponents from doing so, and then relied on their corner backs to sweep up the breaking ball, a job they performed magnificently. Similarly, you rarely see Cork's Diarmuid O'Sullivan reaching up for incoming ball. Instead, he stands his ground and pulls on the ball, a technique which he has developed almost to the level of perfection.
Waterford's failure to get Declan Prendergast to do likewise (or to replace him with someone who could) left them with an Achilles heel which Limerick were particularly well-equipped to exploit. Indeed, it is amazing that Limerick did not make more use of the high ball into Begley - they used it only three times during the entire game, and in all three cases goals ensued. By contrast, Waterford sent no less than 17 high balls into the Limerick goal area during the course of the game. The total would have been four higher were it not for mishits by Ken McGrath and Tony Browne, the principal sources of these high balls. Of these 17, Limerick won twelve, while of the five cases where Waterford did manage to get possesion, not even one ended up in a score.
This points to a fundamental flaw in the make-up of this current Waterford team - their inability to translate abundant possession into scores, simply because they do not use the ball intelligently. In particular, they have no plan for getting the ball into their potentially lethal inside men, John Mullane and Paul Flynn. Surely there is a better way of making use of their talents than hoping they will feed off breaking ball in a crowded goalmouth. That both players were taken off is more a reflection of the lack of creativity in the Waterford play from out the field than of their own inadequacies.
The contrast with Limerick's use of Andrew Shaughnessy is almost startling. During the course of the game, no less than 15 balls were played into O'Shaughnessy, 13 of them in the first half. From these 13 balls, Shaughnessy scored 1-1 from play and three points from frees for fouls committed on himself. However, Limerick's play wasn't just about getting the ball into O'Shaughnessy. They repeatedly played the other wing also, eschewing the easy high ball into the goalmouth, even though it proved to be a most rewarding ploy on the three times it was used.
Watching the video of the game, it was noticeable how often the Limerick players looked up before playing the ball. An Moltóir counted 27 such cases in all, compared with just ten for Waterford (an extraordinarily low number). All in all, Limerick looked a much better-coached outfit than Waterford, despite Justin McCarthy's established reputation in this area.
Waterford were not helped either by several more strange selectorial decisions by McCarthy. The previous week, the pairing of Brick Walsh and Eoin Kelly produced Waterford's best midfield display in many years. YetMcCarthy broke up the pairing in order to accommodate Jack Kennedy, whose previous performances in the Déise jersey hardly merited his inclusion. During the 24 minutes Kennedy was on the field, Mike O'Brien ruled midfield while Eoin Kelly hardly hit a ball at centre forward. After Kennedy was replaced (with Kelly moving to midfield), O'Brien disappeared out of the game (he played the ball eleven times in the first half and twice in the second) while Kelly became much more actively involved (he played the ball once in the first 24 minutes and eleven times in the remaining 50).
While the restoration of the Walsh/Kelly midfield played a key role in swinging the game back in Waterford's direction, McCarthy was not prepared to let well enough alone, as he moved Walsh into the forwards to accommodate Shane O'Sullivan when he replaced John Mullane in the second half. This was again a strange decision, as O'Sullivan's lack of physicality and better scoring record would surely have been better suited to a wing forward berth,leaving Walsh in the crucial midfield engine room.
A final key factor in Limerick's victory was their ability to stop Waterford from gaining possession from their own puckouts. In the replay against Cork, Waterford won over two thirds of their own puckouts. In the semi-final, this fell to 40 per cent (and just 30 per cent in the crucial first half). This was partly due to Limerick crowding the landing area for the Waterford puckouts and picking up the breaking ball. However, of even greater importance was Waterford's failure to use their main ball-winners,Dan Shanahan and Seamus Prendergast, as puckout targets, especially in the first half. Shanahan was only used twice as a target in this period, while Prendergast (who spent most of the half in the full forward line) wasn't used at all. Waterford won a lot more of their own puckouts when Prendergast was brought out in the second half, which raises the question as to why he was left in at full forward, where he was achieving nothing, while Waterford were being cleaned out on their own puckouts.
There has been a big outpouring of grief and regret at Waterford's latest failure to make it to the All-Ireland final. However, their case shows that you need much more than raw talent to make it to the top. You also need a plan, you need players capable of playing to the plan, and you need to place them where they are most effective. Waterford are deficient in all these areas.
Limerick have been able to combine great passion and commitment with no little skill and an ability to use the ball well. Here's hoping they can reproduce this combination on the first Sunday in September. If they can,we could have a hell of a final.
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