The form is difficult to assess but Waterford may just have enough in the locker

WHEN THE draw was made and the odds compiled, this seemed an obvious win for Waterford: the champions against the worst team based on last year's form. But after a League campaign during which neither of them showed anything, this year's form is impossible to assess. Clare are under new management and all the vibes coming out of the camp are right with the exception of whatever difficulty there is with Gerry Quinn.

Waterford are missing their best player, Ken McGrath, plus a potentially very good forward in Eoin Kelly, an outstanding corner back in Eoin Murphy and Paul Flynn.

It tells you how long McGrath has been central to Waterford that he played against me on his debut. All of the great moments for the county in recent times he's been there: the Munster win in 2002 - unforgettable for the opposing manager - when he was banging a wet ball over the bar from everywhere; the catch against Cork in 2004.

Then you have Dan Shanahan and Séamus Prendergast just getting over injuries.

These problems are particularly significant for Waterford because the depth of their panel is suspect.

I also give Clare a much better chance of winning this year than they would have had last year. The question is - how good are they? They would need to be an awful lot better than in recent years.

Waterford with a full complement and in the right mood could beat anyone on a given day but Clare couldn't.

In the league, Waterford seemed to be saving themselves for later in the year. That's a really dangerous game. I believe in doing well in the league, and last year when Waterford won it I had no doubts about them going into the championship. This year they appear to feel that spring campaign was their undoing. That's a myth.

It reminds me of Tipp last year.

You can be 100 per cent sure that Tipperary will perform against Cork next week but last year after a poor League when they were getting ready to play Limerick you couldn't have been sure and this time I believe you can't be sure of Waterford.

That is important because although a lot of people are unaware of it, the qualifiers are a lot trickier this year. There are no more guarantees for Munster counties that they'll reach the All-Ireland quarter-finals. Waterford would be much better off winning Munster this year than they were last year.

Despite the injuries, Waterford still have good players. Kevin Moran's a good addition and I was surprised that Dave Bennett wasn't used more last year but John Mullane has been low on confidence for a while and needs to rediscover the sort of form he had a couple of years ago.

Every year the end of the line gets closer for Waterford. They brought in good newcomers, Stephen Molumphy and Aidan Kearney, last year but even so they were still short of options in the last quarter of an All-Ireland semi-final when they had to replace Flynn and Mullane. Now there's another year on the clock. There is a limit to how long Waterford can keep going even if they've defied the most pessimistic predictions in recent years.

Maybe there's another year in them; maybe not. There's certainly not two.

Clare haven't won a Munster match for five years but you got the impression they've had tough draws and didn't seem to be losing much sleep over it. In the qualifiers Clare were always more dangerous but Mike Mac has already made it clear he wants to improve their poor record in Munster.

How good are Clare? Have they the firepower to get over even a weakened Waterford? They've been training really well while Waterford have had injuries and disruption. If there's any doubt about Waterford's attitude or the intensity of their preparations it will show.

It's no harm to point out that Michael Walsh's league form wasn't great but he looked like someone who was working hard. There was the sluggishness of heavy training about him.

His improvement is important because if Clare are to succeed it will be because their opponents won't be able to win enough ball.

In that case, Clare's standard 2-14 or 2-15 would be enough to win and it would have to be. Apart from Tony Griffin's heroics two years ago the team's performances have been more marked by failure to take scores than the ability to rack them up.

It's hard for me to jump the line and say Clare will win because although Waterford don't have the resources to replace all those who are missing I still think they have enough to get out of this.