Inside Track with John McIntyre

All the talk ahead of this year’s senior hurling championship focused on St Thomas’ quest for an historic seven-in-row. Nobody was speculating about the prospect of the county champions being dragged into a dogfight to even qualify from their group.

But that’s what lies ahead of Kenneth Burke’s charges after their shock stumble to Tommy Larkins at Duggan Park on Sunday evening. This was no fluke win either. It wasn’t as if the Woodford men burst into an early lead and weren’t for catching or took the spoils through a late goal

The reality was that Tommy Larkins were significantly the better team. Inspired by the Murphy brothers, Eanna and Ronan, together with big contributions from the likes of Conor Gardiner, Jason Flynn and Cathal Tuohy, they produced arguably the club’s best display of the modern era at this level.

St Thomas’ knew they were in a spot of bother at the break despite leading by two points. What followed was a long interval debriefing in the dressing room, but Conor Cooney and company were raging against the tide as Larkins took flight midway through the half, with Ronan Murphy’s goal propelling them to a 1-24 to 0-19 victory.

Not alone did the result shake up St Thomas’, but it has shaken up the championship. Of course, the title holders made light of an even heavier group loss to Turloughmore in 2022, but the team is two years older now and the miles continue to tick up on the clock.

On all known form, St Thomas’ will recover some lost ground when facing Gort in a local derby in their final group outing. A defeat wouldn’t be fatal provided Killimordaly don’t beat or draw with Tommy Larkins, but suddenly there is some pressure on the title holders, and they have work to do.

Gort haven’t really been a factor in the championship for years, but they should relish getting stuck into St Thomas’. I saw them playing against Killimordaly last Friday, and they weren’t great. Sure, Greg Lally, Jack Grealish, Richie Cummins, Aidan Helebert and Jason Grealish could be inspired by that challenge, but some of their younger players are still in the development stage.

The big question is, however, are St Thomas’ finally creaking at the seams or was the Larkins result an aberration? They have been a long time on the road and there were many games during their sustained run of dominance when they had to dig deep to keep the show on the road. My hunch is that they will quickly get back on the wagon.

Pictured: David Hickey of Tommy Larkins on the attack against Evan Duggan of St Thomas’ during Sunday’s Senior Hurling Championship clash at Duggan Park. Photo: Joe O’Shaughnessy