Pure Munster hurling.
There’s so much riding on this one.
Cork and Clare have a hurling rivalry that stretches back years. We all remember 2008 when the same teams were so fired up for a Munster championship clash that all hell broke loose in the tunnel going out to the game.
That same tension, that same intensity is still burning brightly. The Banner and the Rebels were the last two teams standing after the first ever Munster round-robin series.
John Meyler’s side defeated the 2013 All-Ireland champions in the opening round of the provincial series but Clare have been going up through the gears since then.
Their successive victories over Tipperary and Limerick ensured they came into this one with plenty of belief and plenty of confidence and they started off the decider like a house on fire.
John Conlon was causing wreck on the edge of the square and he took Damien Cahalane for five points from play in that opening half. David Reidy was similarly on song and the Éire Óg Ennis club man, fired up on the back of an unjust red card last time out against Limerick, thundered into this game.
He scored a cracking opening goal for the Banner and that was quickly followed up by a flicked on Peter Duggan belter.
Patrick Horgan was keeping Cork in the game with his fine point-taking while Mark Coleman was faring well in the half back line.
It was an absolute feast of hurling in the Thurles grounds but nothing summed up the teak tough atmosphere better than Clare centre back Conor Cleary’s act of heroism on 25 minutes.
Cork speedster Conor Lehane won the ball out in front of the UL student and he turned him and headed straight for goal. Cleary petulantly thrown his hurl in the direction of the Middleton man, just like John Tennyson did to Lar Corbett in 2010, but unlike the Kilkenny man, Cleary made the ground back on Lehane only to hook him with his bare hands.
He flings his hurley away here.
He chases him back.
And stops a certain goal with a hook with his bare hands.
That’s what it takes.
