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Content Zone
Thu 05-Oct-2000 18:59
More from this writer..
An Moltóir
The Intergenerational Transmission of a Congenital Disorder West of the Shannon
An Moltóir a little belatedly salutes Limerick's achievement in virtually coming from nowhere to capture this year's Under-21 Hurling All-Ireland title...
It is unusual, but not unprecedented, for a county to win this championship without some kind of pedigree at minor level. Waterford did it in 1992 (although they did have Paul Flynn on board, who had won a Munster minor medal earlier that year). Offaly also managed to win this year's Leinster championship with a team bereft of minor silverware. Of course, the Faithful County does have the unenviable record of winning three minor All-Irelands in four years in the late 1980s yet failing to land the Under-21 crown subsequently.
Limerick's victory over Galway was the ultimate 15-man effort, with nobody shirking the task of getting stuck in and stopping the Westerners from playing the kind of open, fluid hurling they prefer. It was wonderful to watch the Shannonsiders' total commitment in scrapping for every ball, and using their bodies legitimately to spoil the opposition.
An Moltóir has always been of the view that a team with one good forward and everyone else pulling their weight is capable of winning games. He is also of the view that the team with the more committed and positive attitude tends to get the breaks, and so it proved on this occasion. Both teams got one decent chance of a goal: Galway made a hames of theirs, while Mark Keane for Limerick made no mistake. It also noteworthy that Keane didn't miss one free throughout, hereas Galway's Dave Donoghue faltered a couple of times when the pressure came on in the second half.
Overall, Galway probably had more skilful hurlers than Limerick, and gained a lot of possession around midfield, especially in the second half. But the old Galway failing of running with the ball rather than letting it go, once again proved to be their ruination. It was pathetic to see David Tierney being brought in at full forward and then not getting one decent ball from out the field.
An Moltóir reckons that the wonderful Galway team of the 1980s could have won up to five All-Irelands if they didn't have Cyril Farrell in charge. His utter commitment to what our distinguished contemporary, Kevin Cashman, terms the "jennet express" approach to hurling was a crucial factor in Galway losing All-Ireland finals to the more direct hurling of Offaly and Cork. Now we are seeing what the sociologists would term the intergenerational transmission of a congenital disorder west of the Shannon, in that one of the foremost adherents to Farrell's style of hurling, Brendan Lynskey, was in charge of this year's Galway under-21 team. However, Galway are in good company on this one: both the Cork seniors and the Kilkenny under-21s resorted to the same running game - with equally fruitless results - when things started going against them in their respective games against Offaly this year.
All in all, this year's under-21 championship was a fascinating competition. In Leinster, Offaly produced a very timely winning effort just when observers were beginning to bemoan the lack of obvious successors for their ageing senior side. An Moltóir suspects that the senior players on the team had their minds elsewhere when they took on Galway in the All-Ireland semi-final. In Munster, we had the extraordinary situation where the All-Ireland and Munster champions of three years ago both fell at the first hurdle, with Clare going out to Limerick and Tipperary failing at home to Waterford. The latter game provided some consolation for the Déise men, who were robbed of victory by a late Tipp goal in the corresponding minor encounter in 1997. Interestingly, however, fewer than half that Waterford team survived into under-21 ranks three years later.
In their semi-final against Cork, Waterford played some excellent hurling and ran up a very respectable score of 1-15. However, they fell victim to a superb display of point scoring by the Leesiders, who finished with 1-26. This despite the fact that their half-forward line was cleaned out in direct one-to-one exchanges by the Waterford half backs. However, the crucial difference was that the supply of ball sent into the Waterford forwards (and especially their dangerous corner men) was less than satisfactory, whereas the Cork half backs were able to pick their forwards out thanks to bunching among the Waterford half forwards which allowed Cork men, time and Again, to pick up loose ball.
In view of their scoring efficiency against Waterford, it was ironic that poor marksmanship undermined Cork in the drawn Munster final. Even then, they seemed - in typical Cork fashion - to have snatched a late victory until John Meskell bravely fired over a last-gasp free. This gave us a first glimpse of the never-say-die spirit, which was to carry Limerick to ultimate All-Ireland honours. Their utter destruction of the Rebels in the replay was absolutely astounding, and reminiscent of their senior victory over the same opposition in Páirc Uí Chaoimh in 1998. While An Moltóir has no particular grudge against Cork, it still gives him some pleasure to see them getting an occasional taste of the medicine, which they have regularly meted out to the "weaker" counties over the years.
Overall, then, the indicators from this year's under-21 championship are that the evening out of standards among the top hurling counties which emerged in the 1990s is likely to continue. Limerick, Offaly, Waterford and Galway all produced useful teams, while one presumes that the Clare team which won the minor All-Ireland in 1997 will produce a fair share of decent senior players in time. There is, of course, no fear of Cork, Tipperary and Kilkenny.
Now, if only Dublin can build on this year's handy minor team and Wexford could pull some rabbits out of the hat, we could have some interesting hurling championships in the coming decade.
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