After a weekend of one-sided affairs in football and hurling the big ball code dominates on Sunday, but there are no guarantees we’ll see too many close contests.
Four quarter-finals in three provinces (and two countries) are up for decision as hurling takes a week off to mull over the beatings handed to Wexford and Cork by Dublin and Tipperary respectively.
The Premier County’s footballers are among the eight teams in action as the Championship takes its foot off the accelerator somewhat. However there are still issues at hand in all four fixtures.
Connacht SFC quarter-final – London v Mayo, Ruislip, 3pm
Two teams from the west are crossing the Shannon and the Irish Sea this weekend for battles with familiar foes, but the Mayo footballers chances of success are far greater than the Connacht rugby team’s.
While Pat Lam’s PRO12 surprise packages have a fighting chance in Murrayfield on Saturday, Stephen Rochford’s five-in-a-row provincial champions will be expecting to win at a canter against their hosts in Ruislip.
The league was a mixed bag for the new Mayo boss, even if expectations have not been dampened by four defeats in Division 1.
However pressure will be ratcheted up if there is any repeat of the 2011 drama, when extra-time was required to find a way past the stubborn Exiles in James Horan’s first Championship game in charge.
Horan believes defeat that day may have spelled the end of his reign. Instead Trevor Mortimer saved his bacon and the most successful period in six decades was born.
Rochford will be keen to avoid that drama and a clinical display – like that exhibited by Tyrone in Derry last week – will see the buzz build around the Green and Red ahead of a provincial semi-final showdown with old foes Galway.
Verdict: Mayo
Munster SFC quarter-finals – Limerick v Clare, Gaelic Grounds, 2pm
On Monday Podge Collins’ return to fitness after suffering a cruciate injury in a club match last June will be the subject of a television documentary.
The knee injury robbed the Clare footballers of their marquee star, who had taken the seismic decision to throw his lot in with his father’s football team, rather than the hurlers with whom he won an All-Ireland in 2013.
That rift has since been healed and Collins is officially in the ever shrinking tribe of dual players, even if he is not expected to start Sunday.
Next month he will line out for Davy Fitzgerald’s league champions in the third instalment of their early season epic with Waterford, but before that he will be lining out with some other league champions.
That the Banner go into this local derby as favourites is testament to a tremendous league campaign that saw them promoted to Division 2 before beating Kildare in a Croke Park finale.
The Lilywhites’ dour and dire one-point win over Wexford on Saturday evening might dampen wider expectations but Clare will be hopeful of beating Limerick with enough style to provide some momentum ahead of a semi-final meeting with Kerry.
Fans of Jimmy Barry-Murphy, Greg Blaney and Teddy McCarthy will be loving the prospect of Collins lacing up his boots twice in seven days next month for his county, against the Waterford hurlers and Kerry footballers.
Verdict: Clare
Munster SFC quarter-finals – Waterford v Tipperary, Fraher Field, 3.30pm
Waterford’s 22-point defeat to the same opposition at the same stage of the GAA’s own answer to Groundhog Day – the Munster football Championship – would suggest this will not be the weekend’s most keenly contested encounter.
However there is hope for the Déise, stemming less from their own Division 4 performances and more from the fact that ruthless Tipperary team has been filleted.
The Premier County have lost 11 of the panel that featured a year ago in Thurles for this trip to Dungarvan’s inhospitable Fraher Field.
The jewel missing from the most prominent setting is Under-21 Munster winning captain Colin O’Riordan, who signed terms with the Sydney Swans late last year. Then Stephen O’Brien and Seamus Kenny joined Michael Ryan’s hurling panel (no Banner County sharing of resources here) and others decided to spend the summer abroad.
“It has been extremely hard to try and fill those gaps because of injuries and then we lost three players to America and that was a big blow. We are travelling to Waterford without a huge amount of players. We must now move on and play the hand we have been dealt,” said manager Liam Kearns.
Waterford are unlikely to find a way through those gaps, but awaiting the winners are Cork, who are unlikely to be so accommodating.
Verdict: Tipperary
Ulster SFC quarter-final – Cavan v Armagh, Breffni Park, 3.30pm – RTÉ 1 (3pm)
Kildare was not the land of milk and honey either Kieran McGeeney or Seanie Johnston were hoping for, but it cost Geezer far less than the talented forward.
Who can forget his hurling debut for Coill Dubh, the point against his native Cavan on debut and the underwhelming way in which the whole farrago fizzled out.
Both prodigal sons have returned to their native Ulster lands and, if they left in different circumstances, they have returned to radically altered situations.
McGeeney retired in 2007, having led Armagh to three straight Ulster titles ibetween 2004-2006 (six in total, plus the historic 2002 All-Ireland triumph). The Orchard County were a powerhouse. Not any more, as their return to Division 3 suggests.
Contrarily, Johnston has returned to Cavan to find a side, if not quite returned to their glory days of old, at least heading in the right direction. They’ll play top flight league football next year and, not only that, Johnston has been welcomed back into a team that no longer required him to carry 14 men on a hod.
Gearóid McKiernan and David Givney now do lots of the heavy lifting in attack and Johnston seems to be enjoying the freedom, and the acceptance.
In contrast, McGeeney must be wondering if his Orchard will ever deliver another crop like that with which he won so much.
Verdict: Cavan
