Inscrutable Waterford get the uneasy nod

MUNSTER SHC PREVIEW/Tipperary v Waterford: While Waterford's dynamic hurling has laid waste Clare and Tipperary in the past two Guinness Munster hurling championships, the team's inscrutable inconsistencies have been laying waste the best efforts at punditry

And part of the great mystery of tomorrow's provincial semi-final is no one can be sure which teams will show up, let alone who's likely to win.

A fortnight ago we accepted Clare had an excellent track record in this regard, certainly more reliable than Waterford's, but all such attempts at rationalisation led to a dusty end.

Undaunted this weekend, we accept two things: one, that Ken Hogan will have Tipperary right for the starting gun and two, we still can't be sure which Waterford will arrive - the side that twice within the past two years produced dazzling and irresistible displays or the one that has suffered crises of confidence in all other big matches.

Tipperary have gone for a strange line-up with unexpected selections and rumours of a dummy team.

Former defender John Devane has been getting a run in the full-forward line in recent challenges and practice matches and there is a suggestion that he or league regular Séamus Butler will feature as a late replacement.

The favourite to make way is Lar Corbett, whose miraculous progress from the man who it seemed might never walk again last week to starting at corner forward tomorrow hasn't, according to reports, quite gone all the way.

Should Devane start it makes Tipp's line-out all the weirder. Hogan's management to date has been steady, if not cautious, getting things back on track after last year's traumas.

Unveiling a new, converted full forward and an under-21 centre back in a Munster semi-final would be a fairly wild start to his first championship match as a manager.

But will Diarmuid Fitzgerald, after a season playing wing back, really start at centre back? It would be a startling move. Hogan started the year giving John Carroll a spin at centre back before settling on Declan Fanning for the latter stages of the league.

Now on the eve of the championship there's the prospect of a rookie in the position - unless rumours that Tommy Dunne might revert to the position he filled last year prove accurate.

More probable indications are that Paul Kelly will switch with Colin Morrissey and that Dunne and Paddy O'Brien will swap on the right flank of the attack.

Waterford, for once, have made their most obvious switch in announcing the team. Tom Feeney, out of sorts since his club move to Sarsfields in Cork where he's based and anyway more comfortable at corner back, makes way for Declan Prendergast at full back.

The relevant question concerns what range of performance from Waterford would be sufficient to beat Tipp. The problem here is Justin McCarthy's team have established a pattern of being either full on or incapable of coping over 70 minutes. A wide range maybe, but no great choice of possibilities.

Yet there are arguments in favour of Waterford. The performance of three weeks ago proved they are still capable of such heights, regardless of Clare's collapse. Their record against Tipperary is good: two wins out of the last three championship meetings and a morale-lifting comeback when they needed it in the league.

They have a spread of scoring forwards, John Mullane, Paul Flynn and, of late, Dan Shanahan, than their opponents, too dependent on Eoin Kelly, lack and may also have solved the conundrum of where to play Ken McGrath, who looked made for centre back in Thurles.

In Tipperary's favour is they field 10 recent All-Ireland winners and have in Kelly a top-class predator, who will make hay unless Prendergast improves the Waterford full-back line.

Can Waterford put together decent performances back-to-back and confront the charge of inconsistency? That's the big question but there are more to be answered by Tipperary: underperforming forwards and debutants in key positions to name two.

At the risk of being stung for the umpteenth time, the choice is Waterford.

TIPPERARY: B Cummins; T Costello, P Maher, P Curran; E Corcoran, D Fitzgerald, C Morrissey; E Enright, P Kelly; P O'Brien, J Carroll, B Dunne; T Dunne, E Kelly, L Corbett.

WATERFORD: S Brenner; J Murray, D Prendergast, E Murphy; B Phelan, K McGrath, T Browne; D Bennett, M Walsh; E McGrath, D Shanahan, E Kelly; J Mullane, S Prendergast, P Flynn.