CORK manager Kieran Kingston was disappointed with the Munster Senior Hurling League final loss to Limerick as the Rebels seemed to lose their way in the second half of what had been a competitive game early on.

The Cork hurlers had enough to see off Waterford and Kerry in the group stages of the preseason tournament but were well beaten by a slicker home outfit on Saturday night.

“Obviously we are disappointed at how if finished, we thought we were in it at half-time. But in the second half, we seemed to lose our way and Limerick ran out very deserving winners.

“We were very competitive in the first half and we had a long of young lads involved tonight, some of whom aren’t on our panel. We are delighted with their attitude and they have been good for us in the games in this competition and in fairness to Pat Ryan and the U20s they supported us when we didn’t have access to some of our players.

“We were very competitive at the start of the second half, but it slipped away from us then."

The likes of Aaron Gillane, Cian Lynch and Tom Morrissey were critical to Limerick's success, though Cork had some experienced hurlers in their line-up too, while Patrick Horgan came on at the break.

“We tired, there is no question about that, and they didn’t and they were able to introduce some senior players. We hadn’t the ability to do that but that is the beauty of this competition. 

"It gave us the opportunity to get some game time into some of our players, senior lads who hadn’t hurled since July and some of the younger lads who have come out of U21 and U20 in the last few years.

“It has worked well for that as we have 21 players missing with Fitzgibbon Cup and we will have to do without them for a while. It’s great for them to go and play in that competition and it gave us the chance to look at a few other lads because of that.

“If we didn’t have those games then we wouldn’t have been able to give them the exposure they got. There is a massive gap between playing club hurling and competitions like the U20 championship last year."

Next up is the league opener against the Déise.

“Our focus turns to our league game against Waterford now and it’s always tough going down there but we are looking forward to that challenge."