Croker clash with Dubs to serve as valuable milestone
By Kevin Egan
Not unlike the senior footballers, the Offaly hurlers effectively have two shots at locking down a league final berth and promotion.
One home game remains against Westmeath on Sunday week. That’s a fixture which would have been seen as a toss of a coin tie a year ago but on current form, Offaly will be widely tipped as the likely winners.
While it’s hard generate too much concern about the footballers’ trip to Leitrim, that home tie against the northern neighbours should be a serious examination of where Offaly are at, and it will get a lot tougher if Johnny Kelly’s side run into a speed bump in Croke Park tomorrow evening (Saturday).
Assessing Dublin at this stage of the season isn’t easy. They handled Antrim while hurling in second gear, and their trip to Mullingar wasn’t plain sailing but they were never in trouble either. This is all while the Na Fianna contingent have been allowed to ease their way back in, with rumours suggesting that two or three may see game time tomorrow, albeit it’s believed that Donal Burke might not be among them.
Last weekend’s third level action was a subtle indicator of how Dublin hurling has really broadened its base, as a significant number of players that wouldn’t have featured for the county senior team all made a strong impression. Joe Flanagan (DCU), Cian Boyle (Garda College) and Ryan Malone (TUD) all played well in their respective finals.
On the club front, Na Fianna won the All-Ireland after coming through some tight games in the county championship, showing that Dublin has quietly put itself in a position where it can match counties like Tipperary, Limerick and Kilkenny for depth.
A slip up here for Dublin would leave them in a position where they would have to go to Waterford and win, or else promotion would be out of their hands.
Expect a serious effort from the home side, and while Offaly’s form is solid a five or six point defeat, ideally in a high intensity, physical battle, is both the most likely outcome and an eventuality that shouldn’t be seen as a failure from an Offaly perspective.