The National Hurling League – not to be confused with the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship (which follows it and ends in the All-Ireland Final) – started a couple of weeks ago so inter-county hurling has been on the telly recently once more. The League is organized in 5 divisions (1a, 1b, 2, 3 and 4) and the TV coverage usually focusses on higher-division teams . Last week for example, there was a televised game between Cork and Tipperary, last year’s Championship finalists, in Div 1a. Cork won a feisty contest in front of a crowd of over 40,000 that exploded into a huge brawl near half-time . Anyway, I was looking through the lower divisions on the web and did a bit of a double-take when I reached Division 4 as I thought I’d got muddled up with the cricket!
Yes, there are two English counties in the Hurling League. There’s also a team from London in Division 3. None of them are doing very well, but if you want to see some live hurling in England you could check out Lancashire GAA, Warwickshire GAA or London GAA.
As it was foretold, today sees the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final at Croke Park in Dublin. Unfortunately the weather isn’t great: there’s been quite a lot of rain already today, and the forecast is for more. It’s also extremely humid (93%).
I will however be watching on TV from the comfort of my living room. For those of you in the UK, there is live coverage on BBC2 from 3pm.
This year’s final is between Cork and Tipperary and takes place this afternoon, Sunday 20th July, with the throw-in at 3.30pm. Cork are strong favourites, with bookies quoting odds of 3-1 on (or even shorter). That’s not surprising because they put seven goals past Dublin in their semi-final a couple of weeks ago.
I’ll update this post with the final score (for the files) when it’s all over.
HALF-TIME: Cork 1-16 Tipperary 0-13. A breathless first half with Tipperary playing with just one man up the field and packing the defence to avoid conceding goals, which they did until the very end of the first half when Shane Barrett scored the first. Tipperary actually had the sliotar in the net earlier on, but the goal was disallowed for a square ball: an attacking player cannot be inside the small rectangle (also known as the “6-yard box”) before the ball enters it. Very noticeable that Croke Park is a sea of red – clearly Cork supporters did better at getting tickets!
FULL-TIME: Cork 1-18 Tipperary 3-27. What an amazing turnaround, and a superb second-half performance from Tipperary! Cork completely disintegrated after half-time, scoring only two points in the half to Tipperary’s 23, including three goals (one of them a penalty that also resulted in Cork going down to 14 men). Nothing went right for Cork, who hit the woodwork 4 times even and even missed a penalty, but by then the game was already lost.
Tippperary are the 2025 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Champions!
Just a quick note, primarily for those of you not in Ireland, to point out that this weekend sees the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final at Croke Park. There’s always a fantastic atmosphere for this event and I’m looking forward to it enormously. It’s every bit as big as the FA Cup Final used to be when I was a kid.
This year’s final is between Cork and Tipperary and takes place on Sunday 20th July, with the throw-in at 3.30pm.
For those of you in the UK, there is live coverage on BBC2 from 3pm.
This is a big weekend for fans of hurling, as we have reached the semi-final stage of the All Ireland Senior Hurling Championship. Yesterday Cork trounced Dublin by 7-26 to 2-21. I’ve never seen such a high scoring game at the top level, nor a margin as large as 20 points (a goal is worth 3 points)! Though not expected by many to progress, Dublin had deservedly beaten Limerick in the quarter-finals but they were never in the game yesterday.
The other semi-final takes place this afternoon at 4pm, and is between Kilkenny and Tipperary. Which of these will meet Cork in the Final? We’ll soon find out!
Update: it was another high scoring match, finishing Kilkenny 0-30 to Tipperary’s 4-20, so Tipperary won by 2 points (with a goal in the last minute). The All Ireland Final will therefore be between Cork and Tipperary.
Both semi-finals are held at Croke Park, as is the final. Many supporters come through Maynooth on their way to these matches, as we’re on the train line that goes into Dublin Connolly via Drumcondra (the nearest station to Croke Park). There is an arrangement by which supporters can park their cars at the GAA ground in Maynooth and take the train, as there is no chance of parking near Croke Park.
Yesterday evening I needed to do a quick trip to the shops and ran into a crowd of returning Cork supporters who had just arrived by train. Most fans were in very good humour (unsurprisingly) but a few were very much the worse for drink: one young lad had passed out on the footpath and concerned pedestrians called an ambulance; over the road at the bus terminus Gardaí were dealing with a drunk and aggressive person; and in Supervalu a hopelessly inebriated bloke staggered into the off-licence part to get more booze but ended up falling over and dropping the cans he had picked up, with one bursting and making a mess all over the floor.
Anyway, none of this is to do with the intended subject of this post. Cork’s victory yesterday reminded me of a little bit of hurling information that I found interesting, concerning the way to hold the hurley. Having been brought up on a different bat-and-ball game (cricket), I was surprised to learn that in hurling you are supposed to hold the bat the wrong way round! What I mean by that is that in cricket the batter holds the bat with the dominant hand at the bottom of the handle near the blade and the other hand at the top. For illustration, here’s a forward defensive shot played by a right-hander:
For illustration, on the left, there’s a forward defensive shot played by a right-hander. You can see the left hand at the top of the handle and the right hand near the bottom. Shots like this are played predominatly with the bat moving in a vertical plane, guided by the left hand with the right hand guiding the direction. A hook or pull shot is played with the same grip but swinging the bat across the body from right to left with more bottom hand.
When I was at school I tried batting left-handed in the nets. It was quite interesting. I found I could play defensive shots equally well that way as with my usual right-handed stance, but I couldn’t play attacking shots very well at all.
It’s the same arrangement in baseball (or rounders, as we call it on this side of the Atlantic). The batter will hold the bat with their weaker hand nearer the end of the handle, i.e. towards the thin end.
On the other hand (!), a hurler holds the hurley the other way round. On the right you can see a hurler at the ready position, with his right hand at the top of the handle and the left hand near the blade. When striking the sliotar (ball), the hands are moved closer together. Holding the end of the hurley in the dominant hand means that more strength can be applied when reaching away from the body with one hand, something that isn’t really done in cricket. The typical long-range strike of the sliotar is rather like a hook shot in cricket, except it’s played the opposite way across the body.
Here’s a video:
This seems very unnatural if you have been brought up to use the opposite basic grip, which explains why so many struggled even to hit the sliotar at the practice at the EAS Social Dinner in Cork a couple of weeks ago. In Ireland, however, kids learn to play hurling when they’re still in kindergarten so this is instilled at a very early age.
I wasn’t able to attend owing to teaching commitments but I gather it was a very enjoyable occasion. There is a news item with some nice pictures here.
It’s worth mentioning that the National Museum – part of St Patrick’s Pontifical University which shares the Maynooth campus with Maynooth University – has a very interesting Science collection, including a large group of scientific instruments mostly associated with Nicholas Callan. The museum now has the largest collection of scientific instruments on public display in Ireland, most of which were manufactured in Ireland between 1880 and 1920. It also contains a collection of ecclesiastical artifacts from the past three centuries. It’s quite strange to see the juxtaposition of microscopes, electrical devices and surveying instruments with rosaries and religious vestments! You can find the opening hours of the museum here.
More importantly, outside the Museum, staff took the opportunity of his visit to teach Brian the rudiments of hurling, a sport which transcends both science and religion:
Just a quick post to mention that this weekend saw the semi-finals of this year’s All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship at Croke Park.
Yesterday, after playing very poorly against Kilkenny in the first half, Clare staged an epic comeback to create an exciting finish, eventually to win by two points (0-24 to 2-16).
Today’s semi-final was even better, with Cork pulling out all the stops against Limerick in the second half in a match that was played at an extraordinary tempo even by the standards of hurling. Cork ran out deserved winners by 1-28 to 0-29. Once again, only two points separated the sides.
Limerick were bidding to win their 5th All-Ireland championship in a row, but they have to settle for four, as the final in two weeks’ time will be between Cork and Clare.
I was intrigued to see this graphic accompanying an article about hurling. Notice that the left hand side shows the field equations of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity and some expressions to do with quantum mechanics. Hurling is indeed an extraordinary – and extraordinarily fast – sport but is the article implying that classical physics is inadequate to describe it? Perhaps it is implying that through hurling we will at last arrive at a Theory of Everything?
No time for a proper post today, but I do have a gap in between meetings to share this wonderful picture of a little lad absorbed by the action at Croke Park during last weekend’s All-Ireland Hurling Semi-Final between Kilkenny and Clare (won by Kilkenny by 1-25 to 1-22, after a strong fightback by Clare). It’s a superb composition, with the little boy seemingly on his own but united with the others by their joint fascination with the game.
The All-Ireland Final (between Limerick and Kilkenny) is on Sunday 23rd July at 3.30pm. Whoever the kid is he might well be there; you can tell from the yellow and black stripes of his replica kit that he’s a Kilkenny supporter…
Today’s the day! Kilkenny v Limerick from Croke Park for the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final. Over 80,000 spectators will watch this in Croke Park as well as millions around the world. Let’s hope it’s a good one.
Half Time: Kilkenny 0-16 Limerick 1-17
Reasonably comfortable for Limerick who have been ahead since the 2nd minute. Can Kilkenny fight back in the 2nd half? I’m glad for the sake of the players that it’s “only” 27 °C at Croke Park this afternoon and not even hotter!
Full Time: Kilkenny 2-26 Limerick 1-31
So Limerick have won their 3rd All-Ireland Championship in a row by just two points.
Kilkenny scored two goals in the second half to level the scores at which point Limerick seemed a bit ragged, but Limerick pulled themselves together held on for the victory in what was a thrilling second half. Hurling is not a game for faint hearts but alongside the physicality of the game there is an astonishing level skill: the accuracy of the long-range shooting is quite phenomenal.
Congratulations to Limerick, deserved winners, and commiserations to Kilkenny who made a fantastic game of it. What a magnificent final.
This afternoon’s All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final at Croke Park saw reigning champions Limerick beat Cork by 3-32 to 1-22 at Croke Park. The margin of victory (16 points) reflected Limerick’s dominance; their total of 41 points is one of the largest ever in a final. The Bookies were right in having Limerick odds-on favourites (1-5) before the match and they thoroughly deserved their victory. Congratulations to them!
As a neutral I was hoping for a less one-sided match, and Cork actually started off quite well, responding quickly to Limerick’s opening goal with an impressive goal of their own. The game started at a frantic pace and for about ten minutes it looked a pretty even contest, but once Limerick got into their stride they imposed themselves on all areas of the game. The Limerick team not only looked physically bigger than their opponents but also put in a phenomenal work rate, to such an extent that it frequently seemed they had more players on the pitch than Cork. I know it’s a cliché, but at times it really did look like men against boys.
When not in possession, Limerick harried their opponents into making mistakes and when in possession they ruthlessly exploited errors in the Cork defence. In particular they exerted their trademark dominance of the middle third of the pitch, scoring points from long range like a boxer with a longer reach than his opponent and making it very difficult for Cork to play through them. By half time, when the score was 1-11 to 3-18, Limerick were already 13 points ahead and the game was effectively over as a contest. It was more like an exhibition match or some sort of masterclass.
Credit to the young Cork side for the way they stuck to their task despite being comprehensively outplayed. There’s no disgrace in losing to a team as good as the one they played today. In the end, though, the Championship title goes once again to Limerick, who were magnificent.
Incidentally, Croke Park was about half-full for this showcase event with about 40,000 spectators in the ground. Hopefully next year it will be possible to fill it to capacity. I watched it on TV but it makes a huge difference to the atmosphere if there’s a big crowd watching it in the stadium.
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In the Dark 