Great Expectations

Killinan End column

The battering Loughmore/Castleiney took against Ballygunner was hardly a shock.

The Waterford champions have won eleven-in-a-row in the land of the Déise, and only one of those finals had a margin of less than nine points. This year’s final against Abbeyside was won by eighteen points. They now face into a seventh consecutive Munster Final appearance which is a remarkable level of consistency.

It was not always so of course. Back in 2014, when Ballygunner’s modern generation had its first stab at the Munster championship, their opening game was a defeat against Cratloe in Walsh Park, a long way from their current sure-footedness at this venue. They were quick learners though. Only Thurles Sarsfields in 2016 who beat Ballygunner by a point in Semple Stadium has prevented them reaching ever Munster Final since that Cratloe defeat. It was a win for Sarsfields which looks all the more impressive in hindsight.

Of course, time was when Ballygunner didn’t have a very prosperous relationship with Munster Finals either. They lost three of their first four in this recent run, including one against Borris-Ileigh, yet they seem to have got stronger. It would be easy to lament Loughmore’s ten-point defeat, but it is a reality that Ballygunner have demolished most opposition in Munster in recent years winning the last three Munster Finals by an average of twelve points. They will play Sarsfields of Cork in the final and last year beat them by nineteen points. The question of what all this says about broader standards of hurling in a county is quite another matter.

Ballygunner are on the brink of setting new standards in the province never mind their own county. They stand at the top of the roll of honour with five provincial titles along with Blackrock and will be expected to go one better. Their illustrious predecessors as standard-setters in Munster were a very different kettle of fish. During the 1970s Blackrock played in four All-Ireland club hurling finals, winning three of them, yet won only five of the Cork titles available during that decade. No question of local domination.

This was a time of intense competition among the big three city clubs in Cork with Glen Rovers and St Finbarr’s also winning two All-Irelands apiece during that decade. Cork’s winning of three All-Irelands 1976-78 and going strong on a fourth in 1979 is hardly surprising in that context. Yet, only four Blackrock players started the 1977 All-Ireland Final – the achievement of the Cork team was a shared effort.

Likewise, while you’ll always get the winter-talk that Ballygunner would beat most county teams, in reality it will take more than the rising tide of one club to raise all of Waterford’s boats. Some of that county’s great struggles in Munster in recent years have happened alongside the ‘Gunners’ golden era. Even when Waterford reached the 2020 All-Ireland Final, they started with just three Ballygunner players. It gives some indication of the vast gulf between club and county even for the better club teams.

It might also be some consolation to take the other side of that coin in respect of Tipperary. The county has ploughed along reasonably well down recent decades without any club teams tearing up trees in their championship. There have been anomalies along the way where Toomevara won championship after championship but often had few players on a Tipperary starting 15, while Mullinahone had several players on Tipp teams in the early 2000s – John Leahy, Brian O’Meara, Paul Curran, Eoin & Paul Kelly – yet had it all to do to win one county title.

It is a sphere of consolation to which Kilkenny might turn now that their champion team, Thomastown, has been knocked out by Westmeath’s representatives in Leinster. To what extent does this reflect the broader standard in the county? There are no easy answers, but one could argue that the excellence of Shamrocks Ballyhale in recent years papered over some of the reality of Kilkenny club hurling. The south Kilkenny club dominated at local level to an extent not seen before, and to give them their due, extended that to national level superbly. The post-Ballyhale experience was always going to interesting for Kilkenny clubs and they will be absolutely haunted by the prospect that this is an omen of dark days to come.

Ballygunner face a different dilemma. Their brilliance in Waterford has finally been replicated at provincial level, or at least if they deliver in the final against Sarsfields to land a four-in-a-row we can certainly say so. Their challenge is to do what Ballyhale did and win another All-Ireland title. To be mentioned in the same breath as Portumna, Birr, and Ballyhale, they probably need a couple of All-Irelands. That might not be straightforward. At some point they will be under stress coming down the home straight in a game against an opponent on top of its game. Their ability to surf that wave and come through will be a far greater determiner of success than putting lesser teams to the sword. Ballygunner are not the only team remaining that will look at the field with great expectations.