Gavin Cummiskey on the concerns raised about the standard of hurling this season

The disappointing quality of hurling, outside Munster, and football, excluding Ulster, in this season's championship was compounded over the weekend by two abysmal displays in provincial semi-finals.

It makes the GAC task of formulating new structures ahead of the autumn's Special Congress ever more pertinent.

Limerick and Cork shared 14 points, eight from play, in a dour Munster football semi-final at the Gaelic Grounds, but it is hurling that poses the more pressing concerns.

Wexford and Offaly restricted each other to a 0-9 to 0-8 scoreline in the Leinster hurling semi-final at Nowlan Park, while on Saturday Kilkenny barely broke a sweat in hammering Westmeath by 14 points.

Speaking at yesterday's Vodafone player of the month awards for May - won by Offaly footballer Karol Slattery and the excellent Tipperary hurler Eoin Kelly - GAA president Nickey Brennan feels the standards would gradually increase.

"A lot has been made of it but I wouldn't be overly concerned. At the same time there has been some great individual performances and some exciting hurling. I wouldn't want to dismiss the whole lot as being an uninteresting championship.

"Munster has been reasonably competitive even if we would like it to be more competitive. Cork look to be the team that everyone has to beat but something tells me that Tipperary won't lie down for them in Thurles. I think we'll get a good final. As regards Leinster, well Saturday night's meeting of Kilkenny and Westmeath was a different type of exercise. In fairness to Westmeath. They took the right approach. They wanted to play Kilkenny and they wanted to play them in Westmeath. Despite what they were saying deep down they probably knew that they weren't going to win. It was a promotional exercise and from that point of view - with so many kids on the field afterwards - it was huge as so many of the Kilkenny players stayed around signing autographs.

"I was somewhat surprised at the end result from Nowlan Park - not so much that Wexford won it - but at the scoreline. However, when I saw that between them they had 25 wides I suppose it goes some way to explaining it. I would have expected a higher scoring game.

"It is a challenging time but from here on in it's going to get a hell of a lot more serious and I think we're going to see more competitive games. I'm not going to talk it down because at this stage it's a premier competition for us."

Tipperary manager Babs Keating, who was also present at the awards ceremony, had similar sentiments, particularly regarding the disappointing display produced by the traditional strongholds of Offaly and Wexford. "It's not a score you would expect on a fine sunny day. Wexford will have to improve an awful lot to reach where Kilkenny are at. Particularly after what happened last year with Wexford. For 50 minutes they were immaculate against Kilkenny in the Leinster final. A lot of things have to change from that."

Both Brennan and Keating paid tribute to the performances of Eoin Kelly in Tipperary's opening championship victories over Limerick and Waterford when he amassed a combined total of 2-23. "We all pointed to (Christy) Ring as the exception in that position, as a corner forward or wing forward but now, skill-wise, I would say Eoin Kelly has as much as I have ever seen," said Keating.

"All the others we have referred to over the years as great players I think they might have had more support than Eoin Kelly has had. The scores that we have got in this year's championship so far prove that. We haven't other players any(where) near his calibre to support him on the scoreboard. That speaks volumes about what Eoin Kelly is."