Confidence levels in Waterford could not be described as robust before Sunday’s league match against Tipperary Even when the patched-together home team were giving the All-Ireland champions plenty of it in the first half, the spectre of relegation manifested a malign presence.
On the GAA’s Beaufort Scale, the wind was, by consensus, a little stronger than the eight-point lead Waterford took into the interval. So, when Tipp started to rumble and make immediate inroads, a mood of fatalism settled even though the locals fought hard to claw something out of the afternoon.
It ended up with a narrow but clear defeat – like the final chapter of Chronicle of a Relegation Foretold. That is what must sting most of all. Waterford had been on a shortlist of two at the start of the season to go down and down they have gone.
Yet, they struggled mightily to escape the yoke of lowly expectation. They had four points after wins over Offaly and – remarkably, considering it remains the only defeat for John Kiely’s team – Limerick. The frustration of losing against Kilkenny last month rankled all the more on Sunday.
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Even a draw that day would have given Waterford an edge going into the final round, in that Kilkenny would need to beat Tipperary by at least six to escape the relegation frame.
In the circumstances, manager Peter Queally’s refusal to engage with media afterwards was unsurprising. The worst had now happened and what was to be gained by bleak public contemplation or maybe settling scores with the match officials?
It was noted that such silence was unusual for the Waterford manager. Even after one of his team’s worst performances, against Galway, Queally came out to admit he was baffled by what had happened. The week before that, he addressed reporters after the disappointment of surrendering an injury-time lead in Kilkenny, saying: “But typical Kilkenny, you know. You never have them beaten until you’re on the bus going home.”
At least he had Galway to look forward to after Kilkenny. And after that disappointing meltdown against the Tribesmen, there was always last Sunday. Now it’s officially all over.
Queally knows better than anyone how dependent Waterford are on everything going right for them. Ballygunner’s second All-Ireland might be good news but the county champions also furnish about a third of his team.
The number of players lost to injuries has been more akin to a natural disaster than the bumps and bruises of a hurling season – and each week has appeared to bring further bad news.
For last weekend’s final showdown, the team lost Stephen Bennett, their most influential forward, to a hamstring injury. The former All Star, who continues to defy medical science in all senses, has endured years of chronic hip issues, but this was a hamstring injury from the Galway match. The same game also cost the team Iarlaith Daly, a key defender.
Bennett’s brilliant second-half had nearly tilted the match in Kilkenny. His scoring touch was a big loss against Tipperary when their second-half output was limited to 0-6, just one from play.
The condensed nature of the split-season schedule allows less time for injuries to heal and requires greater depth of all teams. For those who don’t have such resources, a league campaign can be challenging. Offaly, the other relegated county, have been in a similar situation with a number of key players out of action.
Waterford’s cause wasn’t helped either by the league draw, which ordained that they get their idle week on the final weekend. That meant they got just one break in their schedule, as opposed to their competitors, who had two.
Ominously, for the two counties, both Waterford and Offaly have been shuttling in tandem between Division 1A and 1B for the past three years, getting relegated in 2024, promoted last year and now dropping again. This yo-yo existence makes optimising selection difficult and has championship implications.
It’s now eight and nine years since Galway and Limerick, successively, managed to win All-Irelands after a spring spent campaigning in the lower division. Now, these victories look more and more like outliers.
Prior to 2017, there had been plenty of speculation that no team could reasonably aspire to have a good championship if they were spending the league lining out against weaker teams.
There will be plenty of eyes on Clare this summer to see how the 2024 All-Ireland winners get on after spending their early season in the lower division.
Waterford, of course, have struggled with the provincial round-robin structure since its inception and after six years, have yet to finish in the top three and qualify for the All-Ireland stage. This has been the case whether they finished the league as winners (2022) or ended up in Division 1B, as happened 12 months ago.
It is, however, a demanding context. The province has monopolised the All-Ireland since the introduction of the round-robins, setting a new record for consecutive All-Irelands last year when Tipperary won Munster’s eighth on the bounce. For Waterford and all counties, it’s a very high standard to reach.
Queally made some interesting observations when the championship ended for his players with defeat by Cork 10 months ago.
“I would like to see a change in structure where we’re afforded a little bit of a chance to hurl during the summer when everyone wants to hurl and everyone wants to watch hurling, not in December, January and February.”
It’s an additional burden for teams, who habitually drop out before the All-Ireland stages and have to watch their rivals proceed deeper into the championship, developing residual fitness and big-match experience as they go.
More immediately, like a modern Sisyphus, Waterford must wearily trudge down the mountain and get their shoulder behind the rock and start pushing. Again.
sean.moran@irishtimes.com
