PADDY STAPLETON COLUMN - Experience came to the fore

BACK MAN'S JOB

Paddy Stapleton

 

Sunday was the most tension I’ve felt ever, until the finale of Love Island Monday night of course!

Jokes aside though, I don’t think there’s ever been a better Tipperary win in my lifetime; the most honest performance ever given by a team in blue and gold!

I’ve always felt as a Tipp hurler that your heart and toughness was questioned year in and year out. Even before the game on Sunday, the commentary was about how the Wexford backs would horse it into the Tipp forwards and the expectation is that our lads would just lie down. That can now be firmly put to bed. We came across a hugely physical team, went down a man shortly after half time, all while overcoming some terrible officiating

This hard-fought win was all the more impressive given how dangerous Wexford looked early on. What a game-plan devised by Davy Fitzgerald - he used our lack of speed in the forward line against us in an offensive way. Wexford played like a team on the FIFA video game when you set the tactics to all-out attack. They were running from every direction, especially Shaun Murphy at left wing-back, who seemed to be targeting John O’Dwyer by setting off on support runs whenever he got half a chance.

Was this their eventual undoing though? If you notice in the second half, some of the Wexford backs went down at the same time with cramp, and it wasn’t as late in the game as it usually is. There was still fifteen minutes to be played. Did they blow the head-gasket early on with all the support runs? Did they train too hard in preparation as a result of being without a fixture for the past month? I think both of these things could be true but the Wexford play in the first and last fifteen minutes couldn’t have been more contrasting. They pulled Tipperary all around the pitch in the opening 35 minutes and then for the last quarter of the game they drove ball after ball down on the Mahers and co. If Davy is to be commended for the tactical masterclass early on, you can’t help but criticise going long with all the late puck-outs when they had at least one guaranteed spare man in the back line due to the justifiable sending off of John McGrath. After the game, he complained that his team went too deep, but the easiest way to pull players back out the field was to play a short puck-out and get that man to run the ball. The Tipp backs surely couldn’t believe what they were seeing.

 

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