More is more when it comes to hurling's provincial plan

Despite occasional predictions to the contrary, at the end of the fifth edition of the provincial league format in the hurling championship, there's no sign of staleness creeping in.

It's a mark of the wild success of the round-robin that the primary complaint is not enough of the games are on telly.

This is in contrast with the football championship where a sizable portion of the community are still waiting for it to start.

Fielding queries from casual followers on the football format is one of the banes of our modern existence here. At this stage, there is surely call for an 'are they out now, or what?' helpline that non-internet savvy folk can ring up where they can receive an answer yay or nay. (Can be an automated 'nay' response until the final round of the group phase).

It's hard to credit now that the current hurling structure was hastily voted through as a panicked measure in response to the introduction of the Super 8 format in Gaelic football.

It's even harder to credit that a majority of First World hurling counties were staunchly opposed to its introduction and it only passed the 60% threshold on the strength of the votes from wholly uninterested football counties, who were blasé enough to be leant on by Central Council.

On the day of the vote in September 2017, Ger Loughnane speculated that the provincial league system had been devised by someone intent on "destroying hurling completely" and echoed the common refrain that the association should rename itself the GFA.

Eight months later, Ger, seemingly much taken by the fact that Offaly were about to get relegated, performed a dramatic volte face, declaring the system the best that had ever been put in place for hurling.

It should be better remembered that the format