Limerick boss John Kiely admitted that it’s a pleasant surprise to wind up in a League final after last year’s All-Ireland success.
Apart from a defeat to Cork in round four, Limerick have shown no signs of an All-Ireland hangover with yesterday’s semi-final win over Dublin their 10th in the last 11 League and Championship games.
Kiely said: “If you said to me last September ‘you’ll be in the National League final come March’, I would have said ‘I don’t know about that’, because there were so many unknowns as to how things would happen and how things would pan out.
“All the credit goes to the players, that’s the bottom line, they’ve been absolutely superb. We have a load of work still to do, we know that, but I can’t fault them for their application and their energy in terms of engaging with what we’ve been doing with them over the last four months.”
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Kiely admitted that yesterday’s win was a rather turgid affair.
He continued: “It was a very stop-start game, it wasn’t a very enjoyable game the way it evolved today.
“Some days you just have to grind it out, and this was one of those days you just have to grind it out, to get the job done and get out.
“It was a bit of a frustrating game at times. When you’re used to being able to get into a rhythm in a game, and then you’re in a game which doesn’t find a rhythm, and today’s game never found a rhythm.
“Scores were hard got for both sides, and it just never developed a pattern of play.”
That was partly down to a first half which required three Dublin players - Oisin O’Rorke, Sean Treacy and Riain McBride - having to be replaced having each rolled an ankle, costing Mattie Kenny’s side momentum.
Kenny said: “I felt just half-way through the second half, there was a kind of maybe ten minute period where we allowed Limerick maybe dominate the game. And ultimately that's what's cost us.
“We felt that in a lot of our games we'd finished strong and we did. But there was a 10-minute spell half-way through the second half and we allowed them to get a little bit of a run on us and that proved to be the decisive part of the game in the finish.”
Kenny claimed that Limerick had given them their most stern physical test so far this year, adding: “I think Limerick are probably the most physical side in the Championship at the moment. As well as being very good hurlers, they’re very well conditioned.
“They’re good strong hurlers - a lot to be admired when you’re looking at them.”
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