Contenders ready - Clare and Dublin craving end to provincial pain

Nobody's summer will end this weekend but for two teams the skies will be a lot darker.

Two provincial hurling finals, each mattering that bit more to the contenders than the champions.

In Munster, Clare face Limerick in the decider for the third year running and it feels like now or never under Brian Lohan.

They lost by a point in the Gaelic Grounds last year, having handed the champions their first defeat in almost four years in the group stages.

In 2022, they drew in the round-robin – thanks to a late Diarmaid Byrnes free - and a last-minute sideline from Tony Kelly forced extra-time in the Thurles final. However, the Green Machine found an extra gear to win that by a goal.

In the opening round this April, league champions Clare were nine points up after 52 minutes but collapsed in spectacular fashion to lose 3-15 to 1-18.

To the Banner’s credit they recovered to win their three remaining games, and finish second on points difference to Limerick, who were pipped in round three by a Cork side fighting for survival.

Of course, they claimed Liam MacCarthy in 2013 but Anthony Daly was the last Clare man to lift what is now the Mick Mackey trophy, in 1998, and he hopes that wait won't extend to 27 years.

"It’s massive," Daly tells RTE Sport of Sunday’s showdown. "For us, it’s just a crazy length of time, for the teams we have produced at minor, at Under 20/21 level, not to have won it since ’98.

"Before we had the breakthrough in 1995, we produced a lot of great men, heroes of mine but we weren’t winning as regularly underage.

"I was part of the first Clare team that faced into a third in a row and we used to say we could also be the first Clare team that loses three in a row.

"I think there would have been a feeling in our group