Back In Action

THEY haven’t gone away, you know. After a 15 week break, the county senior hurling title race swings back into action this weekend when the 16 clubs remaining in the championship take part in eight preliminary quarterfinals.Amazingly, the group phase took 40 games to eliminate just four teams, and it has been a sore point for quite a few club hurlers around the county that they have been left without a meaningful game since the start of June.Unlike their football counterparts, the club hurlers don’t have their fate decided through League matches and the group stages seem like a distant memory at this stage. Now they are faced with a round of knock-out games, knowing that any tie that ends in a draw will go to extra time, as the quarter-finals proper have been fixed for the following weekend.After such a long break, quite a number of club managers criticised the championship format when contacted by Tribune Sport this week – with one or two pointing out that the Kilkenny championship is as far advanced as the Galway title race, even though the Cats won the 'grand slam’ of four All- Ireland titles (senior, U-21, minor, and Intermediate) this year.With only the county minors making it to Croke Park, the wisdom of suspending the championship from early June to late September has to be called into question – the only saving grace for the Hurling Board is...