Workrate to the fore as Sheedy sees enough positives from Limerick draw

By Shane Brophy

When you see Liam Sheedy with the twitch in his shoulders on the side-line, you know a game means a little more and the Tipperary manager was satisfied with his teams’ performance despite being unable to hang on for victory against Limerick on Saturday.

“It was a game of four quarters,” he began on analysing the game.

“Limerick had by far the better start, 6-3 up. They were putting us under a lot of pressure, and they were bossing the game.

“But we probably got a handle on it after that, and I thought the second quarter was better. We came back into the game, went a couple of points clear but Limerick dragged us back to be level at half-time.

“Our third quarter was probably our best quarter, we got some lovely scores, there was good movement. We probably left a few scores after it but that is probably the case for both sides on a night like tonight.

“But when we went 19-14 up if we got another point or two, we probably could have pushed on and closed out the game but full credit to Limerick they brought on some top-class players, they probably got a grip on things around the middle of the park. We might have run out of a little bit of juice and a draw is the result and I would say with two quarters each it was probably a fair result.”

Tipperary had their early difficulties with Limerick clearing out space in attack from their forwards to profit but once the visitors settled into a defensive structure, they shut down Limerick to a large degree.

“Structurally, we were very sound and that is very pleasing,” Sheedy added.

“We were probably stretched early on but once we got a handle on that I thought the lads defended very well. It’s great to see Brian McGrath and Bryan O’Mara putting their hand up. They’re a year older, they’re a year stronger. Cairbre (O Caireallain) has done a really good job in terms of their physical preparation over the last number of weeks. That’s a very pleasing aspect of the game. We feel we are assembling a good panel, a good strong bunch and we may see a few more guys next weekend. It is good.

“For us to get a point, it was an important point in a lot of ways because to come in and not get anything out of it after the effort they put in I thought our work-rate throughout the field was very good. I thought some of the blocks we got in on top-class players was a very pleasing aspect of the game. We worked hard, we hung in and we failed to close it out, but we didn’t get turned over.”

Tipperary managed just eight points from play, none in the second half as Limerick began to turn the screw. The visitors also finished with an inexperienced attack with Jake Morris, Dillion Quirke, Cian Darcy, and Mark Kehoe on the pitch trying to win a game against a Limerick side that had more of their first-choice players on the field by the end. However, Liam Sheedy feels the younger players need to experience these environments to develop.

“We struggled to get on quality ball and find space and when we did, we didn’t really finish it off so that is a disappointing aspect,” he said of the second half attacking display.

“Sometimes the final pass was letting us down, but let’s not forget, you can play all the internal matches you like but nothing prepares you for a game like today so that’s probably why you didn’t see really that real crisp style, goal chances, so in fairness to the players they deserve great credit.

“If you are going to face up to the likes of Kyle Hayes, Richie English and Diarmaid Byrnes, they are top class defenders so no better way to learn. You can be messing around and tippy-tappy but there is no tippy-tappy out there with them boys, they are a serious defence so it’s a great education for any of our younger players and it’s great to have got them on the pitch. They’ll learn loads and those young lads are mad keen and mad to learn.”

He added: “There are no shortage of challenges on our side of the group anyway, there are loads of heavy hitters. We’ve Cork next week and Galway the following week, so that’s a great thing, it’s really good preparation, if you want to find out how good a guy is and how ready he is for championship well why not go out and play the likes of Limerick, Cork and Galway. After that we have Westmeath then and Waterford, so at the end of this league we’ll have a really good sense of how championship ready they are and that’s great for us.”