Jake Morris of Tipperary with the Allianz Hurling League Division 1A trophy ahead of the Allianz Hurling League Division 1A Final between Cork and Tipperary at SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh in Cork this weekend. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile.
By John Harrington
The clouds are lifting over Tipperary hurling.
The mood in the county was dark and depressed after last year’s failure to win a single match in the Munster Senior Hurling Championship, but this year’s League campaign has been therapeutic.
Previously apathetic supporters have been wooed back in big numbers by the spirit and skill of a team that’s been leavened by a dash of youth and won five from six matches so far this year.
You could argue that they should have given the team more backing when they really needed it last year, but the players themselves aren’t inclined to trot out that sob story.
As far as Tipperary vice-captain Jake Morris is concerned, the buck stopped with the players and management for last year’s championship campaign and there simply had to be a positive response this year from them first and foremost.
“We had a good long hard look in the mirror internally first before we could start looking at what we could do as a collective,” says Morris.
“Like, to be fair, the management have been great, they helped us in that regard. It wasn’t all on the players. They took on some of the flack.
“They have been great as well. We had a long couple of months to think about things and mull things over and that wasn’t acceptable for Tipperary’s great historical hurling - we have had some great men go before you in that jersey and we didn’t represent it the way we should have.
“That doesn’t mean you have to win All-Irelands every year. It’s the way you go out, your effort and your application. That wasn’t there so hopefully never again we get branded some of them things.
“If we lose a game fair and square we can accept that, but just I suppose, in the right way.”
If the players and management are willing to be self-critical and work hard to do better, then perhaps Tipperary supporters should do the same.
They were hugely outnumbered by both Cork and Clare supporters for their two home championship games in Semple Stadium last year, something that surely filtered down to the players on the pitch?
“I’d be probably lying to you if I said it didn’t,” admits Morris. “ Especially the Cork game, because we were still in the Championship that day. We had a good chance of going through. It was a sea of red everywhere.
“Look, again, I am very aware of it. I am aware of the commitment and the cost of these things and if the connection isn’t there between the team and the supporters it’s hard to ask people to stay going four weeks in a row and put their hand in their pocket to support you.
“Look, we were definitely aware of it last year and we are doing our best to try and improve it now and I think it has been coming along greatly.”
Cork supporters during the Munster GAA Hurling Senior Championship Round 4 match between Tipperary and Cork at FBD Semple Stadium in Thurles, Tipperary. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile.
As someone who lives at home and works in the county as a financial advisor with SYS financial, Morris is fully plugged in to the fluctuating moods of the Tipperary hurling public.
It’s sometimes suggested that inter-county teams live in their own bubble, but the reality is something very different for him at least.
“Ah look sure, we are in the trenches,” he says. “You get up on Monday morning, you’ve to go to work, you’ve to talk to people. There’s no hiding away from it.
“You are down in your leisure centre, in the gym, you are meeting hurling people.
“Tipperary, hurling is the religion like, there is no getting away from it, no hiding from it, so we are very much in the trenches, you have to deal with it head on.
“We didn’t mind I suppose. We were very honest about our assessment of ourselves last year. It wasn’t good enough, so we were fully aware of that. It was a tough couple of months because you are dealing with it and you can’t do nothing about it until you get back in the training field.
“The minute we did start back we were probably at ease that we have the chance to make this better but, look, we are nowhere near the finished article.
“We are just really week on week trying to improve and get better. Where that takes us I don’t know. We’ll have a right cut off it anyway.”
There has been much more conviction about Tipperary’s play in the League this year than we saw in last year’s championship.
They’ve hooked, blocked, and tackled with huge intensity and there has been a much better method and shape to their attacking play.
“Sure look, there has been improvement all across the board,” agrees Morris. “I suppose the team is playing to the style we are supposed to play, we are getting coached to.
“We are getting brilliant coaching over in Thurles. We are playing the way Liam Cahiull wants us to play. That’s what we are there to do. I suppose last year we didn’t represent that but I suppose the work rate is probably the biggest thing I think.
“Definitely the work rate has been improved all across the board in the team and that is giving us more of a chance to get results.”
Tim O'Mahoney of Cork is dispossessed by Jake Morris of Tipperary during the Allianz Hurling League Division 1A match between Tipperary and Cork at FBD Semple Stadium in Thurles, Tipperary. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile.
Morris was one of the few Tipperary players to emerge with any credit from last year’s championship campaign and he’s led by example again throughout the League.
His evolution as a hurler has been interesting to watch. When he first emerged on the scene in 2018/2019 he was an out and out finisher. A young player blessed with speed, skill, and an eye for a score who could do damage in broken play.
He’s still all of those things but now he’s much more centrally involved in matches whereas in the infancy of his career he tended to hurl on the fringes.
What’s really stood out about his performances this year has been the leadership he’s shown by winning hard ball and tackling with a controlled ferocity.
“Yeah, that’s definitely something (tackling) I had to add to my game anyway,” says the 25-year-old. “I was fully aware of that.
“That came from Liam Sheedy early on - he was tracking me on that one. I suppose it’s about coaching and just being coachable as a player, realising that there are different elements to the game.
“I am still trying to improve different elements, areas of my game. Tackling is definitely something that had to come up. I was fully aware of it. I didn’t shy away from it, but that was as a collective, the group, probably the forwards in particular.
“Look, we are trying our best, we are improving slowly but surely on it.”
It’s that honesty and work-ethic that has really engaged the Tipperary public who have responded by travelling to matches in ever increasing numbers throughout the League campaign and will surely be out in force for Sunday’s sell-out Final against Cork in Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
“This year we’ve gotten great support everywhere we’ve gone,” says Morris. “People are glad to see a team that can represent them. And there has been a mood shift from last year.
“Winning games helps, win a few games and the morale comes up around the county, and we just have to keep it going in the right direction.”
