All-Ireland hurling quarter-finals confirmed but Cork just need to take care of business

FROM a Cork perspective, there can be no complaints about this weekend's hurling quarter-finals, with the Rebels confirmed to face Dublin at 1.15pm on Saturday.

They're fixed for Semple Stadium, the Cork hurling faithful's favourite venue, and this Saturday was flagged up from the outset of the campaign as the date in the GAA's master fixture list. After losing the opening provincial encounters with Waterford and Clare, every Rebel was desperate they'd still be standing on June 22.

That the All-Ireland hurling quarter-finals were pencilled in for 1.15pm and 3.30pm slots on a Saturday in the first place is the issue. Wexford tried to get the games swapped to Sunday, on the basis they're hosting the National Féile where the Midleton U15s will represent Cork, but the vote on the decision fell just short of the 60% required.

Had it passed, the Tailteann Cup semi-finals would have flipped from this Sunday to Saturday. Moving them at such a late stage would have been unfair on those whose plans had been based on the set dates the GAA issued six months ago.

Yet, putting Down v Sligo and Antrim-Laois in the secondary competition as the main event this Sunday makes no sense. 

There are only five matches left in the inter-county hurling calendar, where there are 11 in the All-Ireland football series plus the Tailteann Cup semis and final.

This isn't hurling snobbery or an anti-football agenda at all, but the All-Ireland hurling quarter-finals should be front and centre of the weekend action coming up. Thankfully they're on RTÉ, just the second time the Cork hurlers or footballers have been featured this summer, but the timing is based on the URC final at 5pm, which Munster and Leinster both failed to qualify for, and Euro 2024.

The national broadcaster can't be blamed, particularly when Munster were beaten in a home semi-final last Saturday, but it's a bizarre scenario.

For Cork, it's just about getting the job done. They lost All-Ireland quarter-finals when they finished third in Munster in 2019 and 2022, the latter to Galway in the lunchtime Saturday game. They did win the 2021 quarter-final against Dublin but that was a backdoor championship format, due to Covid.

That '22 loss must still haunt Kieran Kingston, whose three-year term as manager concluded after. Galway profited from a goal that caught Patrick Collins early and incredibly wasteful attacking play on a damp afternoon when a five- or six-point win wouldn't have flattered Cork. 

Like Pat Ryan in recent weeks, Kingston got Cork firing again after going down to Limerick and Clare in the Munster round-robin. Outside of the debate about dropping Patrick Horgan for Tim O'Mahony, Kingston and his selectors got the county behind them and pushed Cork back into the mix for the All-Ireland. Yet it all ended in savage disappointment and the sense of a missed opportunity.

In theory, Dublin aren't as good as Galway two years ago, but if you look past their no-show in the provincial final, Micheál O'Donoghue's charges were very good in Leinster, especially up in Salthill. 

They'll give Cork plenty of it this weekend, make no mistake about that.