Clare-Wexford: Long-time strangers can't stop meeting

The disciplinary hearings are concluded, the Clare Two are freed. And Brian Lohan's side are set to re-acquaint themselves with Wexford for the third year running.

The hurling championship was in existence for 115 years before it threw up a meeting between Clare and Wexford and now they can't stop bumping into one another.

The persecuted duo of Rory Hayes and Peter Duggan will be available to play, courtesy of the most sympathetic appeals body in the whole history of arbitration - the Central Hearings Committee.

The GAA disciplinary process is currently as convoluted and forgiving as the Italian justice system.

There were storms of protest in Clare following the latest installment of CSI Sunday Game but little of it surrounded the incidents highlighted and whether they actually warranted red cards.

In any event, Clare piggy-backed on the legal opportunism of the Galway officials - seeking to liberate Cianan Fahy - who had noticed that the CCCC meeting at which the suspensions were proposed had been conducted online.

Yes, the field of technicality offers rich pickings to any aspiring Perry Masons on county boards seeking to quash suspensions.

Wexford are, according to numerous pundits, coming in "under the radar" this week, something which wasn't possible during Davy Fitzgerald's era. Davy Fitz and his teams were always visible to radar.

Many observers had mentally consigned Wexford's 2022 campaign to oblivion after their seemingly disastrous draw away to Westmeath in Round 4 of the round robin. Their vibrant form in the spring was written off as a mirage. Indeed, Wexford were at that time Exhibit A in why the league didn't matter - a mantle which has since been claimed by Waterford.

During the league, all the talk was that