The TJ Reid conundrum - what are Clare to do with the Kilkenny maestro in Saturday’s All-Ireland semi-final?
How Clare handle the Kilkenny attack, and Reid in particular, is central to the outcome.
If John Conlon is centre-back will he mark Reid tight? I don’t believe that he will. In previous games he has sat in the pocket and provided important cover for Clare.
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But if you give TJ space, he’ll hurt you from any distance.
Clare may assign a midfielder to pick Reid up but that has the potential to cause confusion and destabilise the team elsewhere. It’s no small matter and, from a Clare perspective, one that I’m worried about.
But if they can get it right, it could be a decisive factor in their favour.
When I was managing against Kilkenny, I always had TJ man-marked. He deserves that respect.
He’s not the only threat that they have up front though and Clare need to nail their match-ups.
You’d wonder if Rory Hayes will start this time. He can count himself unlucky if he doesn’t but Cian Nolan has done well, to be fair.
Kilkenny seem to have adapted their game since losing to Galway. They’re using the ball way better now having hit it long time after time in Salthill to little effect.
They will be ready and will bring a performance on Saturday evening. Clare will have to step it up considerably from the quarter-final to be able to counter that.
While it was always going to be difficult to reach the intensity of the Munster final again, they were lucky to escape with a win against Wexford, who had chances to finish them off. Chances that Kilkeny are unlikely to pass up if they are presented to them on Saturday.
But while Kilkenny have TJ, Clare have Tony Kelly. I hope he starts on the inside line and then drifts all over.
Against Wexford, he didn’t seem to move out too much. But when he does, his movement becomes very hard to mark and creates a problem no matter who is on him. As well as that, he opens up the space inside for others when he comes out.
How to deal with Kelly is quite the imponderable for Brian Cody. Limerick didn’t man-mark him and it hurt them big time. Wexford did with Shane Reck and it worked well for them, even if Clare played into their hands by leaving inside too much.
The battle between Huw Lawlor and Peter Duggan will be fascinating. Lawlor is one of the best full-backs out there but Duggan is a handful who will test him to the limit.
I’ll be interested as to whether Kilkenny push up on the Clare half-forward line. They normally hold their shape but if they allow Shane O’Donnell and Ryan Taylor to pick up short ball, they will do damage.
The midfield battle is an area where I think Clare have the edge and it’s probably reflective of my views of this game as a whole.
For me, it’s very much the standout semi-final and while Kilkenny will fight like dogs, I believe that Clare will have that little bit too much for them.
LIMERICK-GALWAY
I can't see anything but a Limerick win on Sunday.
It’s a strange thing to say about Galway in an All-Ireland semi-final. They’ve been there so often and you’d always feel that they have a great chance if things fall right for them but, this time, I just can’t see it.
They’ve done ok this year but were still very lucky to get over Cork.
In fairness to Henry Shefflin, he’s given opportunities to a lot of different players and is trying to mould a team to his way of playing. But, as I’ve said here before, I’m not certain just what that way of playing is.
They just seem to be bunching back in numbers and then hitting it long to Conor Whelan. I’d like to see them work it more from the back, shoot from distance, run it from the half-backs and half-forwards and let the odd one in to Whelan too.
Limerick still haven’t hit 100% and Cian Lynch and Peter Casey coming back into the mix gives them a huge fillup.
Aaron Gillane will be a handful for Galway - he’s at his best in Croke Park. I wonder if Jack Grealish or Daithi Burke will pick him up.
Galway will need to have one covering defender and then instruct their wing-backs to follow Gearoid Hegarty and Tom Morrissey. Padraic Mannion likes to hold his shape but if those two are allowed to drift back the field and get on ball, they will do untold damage.
I’m also looking forward to Mike Casey on Whelan, who is one of the most impressive forwards in the game and Galway’s go-to guy. Casey is a smart full-back but he’ll have his work cut out there.
Whelan can’t do it all on his own, however, and Limerick have more than enough around the field to counteract Galway’s best efforts.
ARMAGH-GALWAY ROW
THE GAA will have to introduce new protocols around teams leaving the field after the scenes at Croke Park on Sunday.
I don’t claim to know much about football but I really enjoyed the Galway-Armagh game. It was compelling stuff - but nobody’s talking about that now.
I never minded a bit of argy-bargy breaking out and have often witnessed it with players going down the tunnel - but eye-gouging is another level and completely out of order. The CCCC needs to come down hard on the culprit.
Obviously, the vast majority of games pass off without incident with teams going down the tunnel together but it’s happening often enough now that something needs to be done about it.
It doesn’t seem to happen outside of hurling and football; perhaps it’s because there’s more contact and intensity and niggling in our games but, whatever it is, we now need a solution - just have only one team going down the tunnel at a time.
MINOR FINAL
AS I said here last week, it’s a pity that the minor final doesn’t share the billing with the senior decider anymore, but it should be a really good game regardless.
Tipperary won a brilliant semi-final against Galway, while Offaly hit some outrageous scores against Clare.
It’s massive for Offaly to be in the final and back in the limelight. A win would do so much for them. I just hope that they can perform on the day - there is a lot of expectation around them.
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