The Clare win took all the jeopardy out of the Limerick match yesterday. It became a nothing match for us as we would have still needed to beat Cork (or at least not lose) next week anyway. That's when we can all judge how Limerick will be going - or not - this year.
The idea that Limerick were shoe-ins for another title - let alone six in a row - was always laughable to me as a Limerickman. We're delighted to be written off now. But if we do get past Cork next week, there will be a reckoning. Another Munster final war is not in this team's interests. Let Tipp and Clare murder each other. We'd be delighted to take the back road this year, as we did in 2018. We'd be the creeping dread for the other teams left in this championship...
Mind you, this match with Cork is close to 50-50 now. Cork are very dangerous indeed and if Limerick do not improve dramatically on how we played against Clare (forget yesterday, it had no jeopardy), then we will be out and rightly so. We would have no complaints if we couldn't beat even one of Clare, Tipp, and Cork or win even one of our home matches.
Perhaps this is a year we take off, or perhaps the decline has set in and we're falling away for good. We'll know a lot more on Sunday which is now a bloody awful day, potentially, for me.