McCarthy and Limerick aiming high
By Daragh Ó Conchúir
Limerick captain Lorraine McCarthy has hailed the round-robin structure of the Liberty Insurance All-Ireland Championships due to the regularity of the action and the fact that each team will play a minimum of four games at Senior level.
The All-Ireland Championships take place after the National League and provincial championships, meaning that the training-to-
games ratio is significantly more weighted in the latter’s favour.
McCarthy also welcomes the freshness of new pairings that connecting the provincial championships to the All-Ireland campaign cannot offer.
“It’s an open draw in the Championship so you’re not always meeting people form Munster or Leinster or whatever” says McCarthy.
“Everyone’s meeting everyone. I think the set-up of it is good in the group games, that you’re guaranteed matches. That’s what everyone trains for. You don’t want to be knocked out in Round 1. You want a few matches and to get a run going. I think that’s what makes it.”
Limerick fell to Wexford in the opening round despite a tour de force from Niamh Mulcahy, who scored 1-14, but there is time to get their campaign on track.
“We would have been Intermediate in 2014. Last year we were probably getting to grips a little bit with Senior whereas this year we competed well in the Naitonal League.
“The biggest challenge this year would be to reach, hopefully, a Quarter-Final or Semi-Final. We have pushed teams pretty close. We beat Cork twice this year, ran them very close in the Munster Final, so I think we’re thereabouts. I think the bigger teams will look at us as a challenge.
“To get back to Croke Park would mean everything. We’ve been there twice. We had the win in 2014 and we definitely want a Senior win as well.”
