All Ireland Senior Hurling Championship 2024 (Munster And Leinster Championships,Liam McCarthy Cup)

Cork to catch fire tomorrow and light up Croke Park and Clare. Normally when these droughts end, they end in spectacular fashion. Cork fans will be cautiously optimistic and not want to get ahead of themselves, but there's only one way this logically goes, Cork to blitz them. I'd actually be very worried if I was a Clare fan, I actually think this could be bad.

And I've always felt re-emerging Cork teams, tend to save their best showings for Clare. Think it was in 2003, when that fresh and young Cork team were coming through, they met a very experienced and talented Clare team, and really left a statement to the whole country by the time they finished with Clare that day.

Think it was 2017 when Cork came back as a serious contender, again went in as underdogs against Clare. I think Cork's second half performance against them that day was the greatest 35 minutes of fluid hurling the game has ever seen.

I think bearing all this in mind, and with the pressure Cork are under to end the drought, they mean business here, and will have the bit between their teeth. This only goes one way, Clare being blitzed off the field with lightning speed and hurling from Cork. And the rest of the hurling counties should start to brace themselves for what's coming down the road from Cork.

People laugh but I've been saying this for a few years now, what's coming, and starting from tomorrow, it begins!

I'll explain to people what I've said for a couple of years, and why Cork would dominate in the future. It's not even so much Cork being better, as opposed to how the game in general has developed. People laugh at me but are very short sighted. I got accused of being a wum saying Cork would win 5 in a row, which I didn't.

It's nothing to do with bigging Cork up, rather than the state the game finds itself elsewhere. I've noticed for a long time KK brought a new level of physicality and tenacity to the game under Cody, and Limerick took the blueprint and did it bigger. Most others have now spent over a decade trying to implement ways to copy it.

Cody took over a team of players who grew up the right way playing, and added that fight into them, a lethal combination. But as the county team is generally made up of a select few teams, it was easy for the county's team and style to be adopted by the clubs. But as the development of coming players was based and influenced around this at all levels, coming players in KK haven't actually developed as the all round silky hurlers they once were. We can see this with what's coming through, regardless of what they win here and there, their individuals just don't possess that natural fluidity they once did.

And it's the same for most counties, as most have implemented and aped what KK did. So this is what I've seen and been saying for the last decade or so about hurling. Limericks golden generation possibly put off the inevitable, and people say if this is the case, why aren't Cork winning more. Cork did have internal problems for a long time and yes, have struggled with this system. But that's not the point. The others still have great players, it's more a case of going forward, we'll see the gap widen as time goes on.

For whatever reason, Cork have been very separate to the rest of hurling, in ideology and ethos. They do produce and develop their players differently, and you can see with what they have coming through, how the others will struggle. It's not a case of bigging up Cork, or Cork having a great team to win a few all-irelands, this is a case something that won't change and grow bigger, unless others radically change their structures.

This debate seems like it's all about Cork. It's not, could of been Galway playing this way, or Cork and another two teams, and in that case the gap would widen between those 3 and the rest. Even if Cork lose tomorrow, it doesn't change anything in what's coming, in regards to the difference in quality of player production and development, between Cork and the rest. It will tell in time.

You'll notice Cork have been getting closer to Limerick for some time. It's more one style adapting and figuring out another. Even in the way Limerick usually beat teams, turning it up in the 3rd quarter, whenever they beat Cork, it was different. Limerick were no worse this year imo, it's just that gap that was closing, has now closed. Where Limerick could up it in the 3rd quarter, Cork burned them. They could keep the ball as they are better technically, and leave Limerick floundering as they blitzed them.

They did it in bursts previously but couldn't sustain, so it should of been no surprise when they did. When Cork implement that style to a high degree, it's basically akin to Barca keeping possession. Cork have now found out how to beat and play around the system by being better on a technical level, tire you, and then on a whim run at you and burn you!

As I said, there's only one way this goes going forward. The others are a decade behind in player development, and that's if they start now. You can see the gap of the Cork youngsters as far more complete than their peers, and they're coming through on a conveyor belt at the minute!

Couldn't care less who does or doesn't read it