Galway men look primed for a serious cut at the big one
John McIntyreConnacht Tribune
Inside Track with John McIntyre
OH ye of little faith. Trying to find a Galway hurling supporter who genuinely believed their team could beat Tipperary in the National League final was akin to looking for a needle in a haystack last week. They were almost an extinct species. If anything, a few local fans feared a hiding from the All-Ireland champions.
What transpired, however, was the direct opposite. It’s Tipperary who are left to try and pick up the pieces and heal the scars from a 16-points drubbing. Brendan Maher and his team-mates were bullied into submission on a day when the championship was blown wide open. Their boss Michael Ryan had no explanation for his team’s limp display afterwards – and how could he such was the totality of their surrender.
I expected Galway to go close (and backed them at 2/1), but nobody could have envisaged such a yawing disparity between the teams. Physically, Tipperary were taken to the cleaners – as was their backline – while their highly-rated forwards could hardly land a blow against a Tribesmen defence which rose to the occasion in brilliant style and, in the process, silenced their critics.
Though there was a fair sprinkling of Galway fans in the crowd of over 16,000, there should have been a bigger exodus from the West to the Gaelic Grounds given the proximity of the venue alone. Too many of them don’t believe in this team, partially because they have lived through too many false dawns before. Well folks, it’s time to stop having a mindset framed by failures of the past and to rally behind David Burke and company. Make, no mistake they are the real deal.
Bearing in mind that it’s only late April, it would still be foolhardy in the extreme to suggest Galway are going to win this year’s All-Ireland title, but neutrals were very impressed by what they saw at the Gaelic Grounds last Sunday. There was a real cutting edge to the new league champions and in terms of physicality alone, the Tribesmen will enjoy a marked advantage over virtually all their championship rivals.
Backboned by an uncompromising rearguard, a classy midfield partnership and several natural scoring forwards who are able to win their own ball, there’s a lot to like about the team Micheál Donoghue, Francis Forde and Noel Larkin are stitching together, while you’d also have to be taken by the post-match attitude in the camp after their trimming of a Tipperary outfit which admittedly was miles off the pace.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.