Cork the team to beat if Limerick go out

If Waterford beat Limerick this Sunday, two things will happen.

The overwhelming favourites to win the All-Ireland, the history chasing five in-a-row team, will be out of the championship before the month of June has begun and secondly Cork, for me, will now become the team to beat in the race to win Liam MacCarthy.

A week is a long time in politics and it's an even longer time in the hurling world. This time last week it was all still in Tipp's hands and now people are asking the questions of who the manager will be next year, what needs to change, do the players want it enough or quite simply are we good enough right now to compete?

The answers to these questions are very difficult to find, and it will be a long winter in Tipp trying to find them, but I do believe the right answers will be found eventually. Tipp will be back, it’s just the when and how long that will take that I am not sure of right now.

What’s even more intriguing in the immediate future is what team will take to the field or get the chance to take to the field on Sunday against Clare? A changing of the guard maybe and the chance for the likes of Andrew Ormonde, Sean Hayes, Sean Ryan and Paddy Cadell to say throw us in, give us a chance and see what we have got, because what’s left to lose?

Nothing, and really it is about building for the future now. I’d be throwing these guys in and giving them the experience of playing a top team and seeing first-hand this is what it takes both physically and hurling-wise to compete, and let these guys see that up close and personal in the white heat of battle, rather than watching on from afar or hearing about how physical it was. We will either win or we will learn. Most likely we will learn.

Anyways let’s stick with