GAA
Winning the All-Ireland is a huge achievement for that Tipperary team.
Bringing my mind back to the Munster Final at the Gaelic Grounds, you certainly wouldn’t have predicted that Tipperary would go on and win the All-Ireland.
How wrong we were if we were thinking that and I certainly would have been one of those who did.
They just railroaded Kilkenny in the second half. I was at the match and it was over really as a contest when they went down to 14 men. Up to that it was competitive and even.
When you are in an All-Ireland Final you are going to have quality and any team that is going to be down a man against Tipperary, they will make you pay.
When a team is down to 14 in the modern game, it is going to be that bit easier for the opposition to find space.
With the hurlers Tipperary have, they will find pockets of space and they did it with ease. A good number of people left within 10 minutes of the second half. The vibe up there was disgust.
Everybody felt that the balloon was burst as soon as Richie Hogan was given the red card. Funnily enough he was having one of his best games of the year and would have been a serious threat if he had been left on.
For the red card, I don’t want to be hard on Cathal Barrett, but he milked the situation. In a final like that, you would want to be 100% definite that it’s a red card offence. I thought it was extremely harsh.
If he had met him with the shoulder or full square on the side of the head I would have said yeah, but he grazed the front of the helmet. At the end of the day, common sense needs to come into play in an All-Ireland Final.
To listen to the full Ciarán Carey podcast click below.