Tipperary are confident full back Philip Maher can play in Sunday's Munster hurling semi-final against Waterford. Maher sustained a knee injury playing for his club Borrisileigh at the weekend, and was expected the miss the game in Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
Manager Babs Keating, however, was happy to leave Maher in the team after training last night. The knee injury is not as serious as initially feared and has been responding to treatment, and Keating is clearly eager to give him every chance of starting.
For now, it means Tipperary are unchanged from their quarter-final win over Limerick on May 14th. Midfielder Colin Morrissey lasted only eight minutes of that game because of a leg injury, but he too holds on to his place having regained full fitness.
Paul Kelly has returned to training but is not yet considered fit enough for a starting place. Waterford are due to name their team tomorrow evening.
Tipperary's prospects in the Munster championship changed dramatically after their four-point win over Limerick. Limerick's most experienced defender Mark Foley yesterday recognised Tipperary's strengths on the day, but also talked about his team's hopes to make amends when the qualifiers begin on June 17th.
"Tipp have huge experience," said Foley, "and showed last year and the year before that they had the edge on us. Tipp did look good against us, but Waterford haven't had a game yet. And you just don't know with Waterford. If they were at full strength you'd definitely give them a very good chance.
"But it's simple really why Tipp beat us. Their half backs totally dominated, and gave them a real monopoly on possession. They really just took us out of the game, and made it impossible to get the ball in to our inside forwards.
"Maybe some of the talk about our chances of winning was over-inflated . . . but we definitely feel we're not as bad as we were on the day. We all have our own ideas about what went wrong, but we'd just had three hard games in a short space of time, one of which went to extra time, so maybe we were a little flat on the day."
Foley was in Dublin to collect the inaugural Opel-Gaelic Players Association player of the month (for April). Louth's Martin Farrelly collected the football equivalent.
The draw for the hurling qualifiers takes place on Sunday week. The losers of Sunday's game will be joined by Limerick, Galway, Clare, Laois, Dublin and either Westmeath or Kilkenny, and Offaly or Wexford.
TIPPERARY (SH v Waterford): B Cummins; D Fanning, P Maher, P Curran; E Corcoran, C O'Mahoney, H Moloney; C Morrissey, S McGrath; J Carroll, G O'Grady, J O'Brien; D Fitzgerald, M Webster, E Kelly.
DUBLIN SHL: Kilmacud Crokes 4-19, Commercials 3-9; Craobh Ciarain 3-10, Faughs 1-10; O'Tooles 3-14, Lucan Sarsfields 1-14; Cuala 5-16, St Brigid's 2-10; Crumlin 0-19, Naomh Olafs 2-12.
