By Cian O'Connell

Just before the hurling revolution years, the blueloods of the game dictated the agenda.

Tipperary returned to the summit in 1989, then Cork, in typical red and white fashion, slipped into collect the Liam MacCarthy Cup a year later.

The summer of 1991 featured two Tipp and Cork thrillers before Babs Keating's outfit took care of Galway and Kilkenny at Croke Park.

In 1992 Cork, with Brian Corcoran an emerging force, bested Tipperary down south, but found Kilkenny too strong in September.

Ultimately it was a time dripping with do or die Championship matches involving the three most decorated hurling counties.

During his tenure Babs Keating worked hard on focusing Tipperary minds. Such mental strength and fortitude carried relevance in 1991 because Cork posed all sorts of questions, but Tipperary survived.

“I brought a sports psychologist and on her introduction she put a slide up: 99% concentration can represent 100% failure,” Keating recalled at an Allianz League event at the end of February. "And there was fellas looking across like this (confused).

“The next slide she put up was a guy that left the peloton on the Tour de France, cycling on his own for two and a half hours on the Alps. Coming into the finishing straight, 50 yards from the line he put his hands up in the air. He was pipped by that much on the line. Now was that 99% concentration or 100%?

“She put up a slide about a jockey in Leopardstown that never came back after it. After jumping the last fence with 50 yards to go and he put his hands up in the air. Paul Carberry tipped him by that.

“Now the concentration levels that our team had...when I see fellas playing wing-forward in hurling and the goalkeeper is pucking out the ball and they walking the other way. We'd be on our toes jumping, waiting for that ball. I can pick out so many incidents.”

A few decades ago Keating regularly brought people from outside the camp into speak with the Tipperary team.

“I did, I did,” Keating admits instantly. “Now look, we brought sports psychologists in. I was lucky in that I lived in Dublin all those years and I was mixing with all the other sports.

“Sports people in Dublin compared to rural Ireland, there was a bit of a club and I was part of a great society, the Links Golf Society, who had eight outings a year.

“I was mixing with the rugby players and chatting with them. Jack Kyle, one of the great gentlemen, I was lucky enough to play golf with him several times.

“I learned a few very important points that I would make to anybody today. The first match I played with Tipperary, we played Wexford in a league final. I ran onto an aul ball around centrefield, half-back. Let fly. Dribbled wide.

“Tony Wall was one of the great exponents of hurling and he had written a book, the first to write a hurling book. I travelled to training with Tony and he said to me, 'Now young lad, you're a very good hurler. But no player playing hurling for Tipperary strikes a ball unless he has a reason for it. You did that last Sunday.'

“He was right. Now, think of it. The amount of players you see striking a ball with a hurley without looking. The Tipperary team I became part of after that, we were so confident in ourselves, from John O'Donoghue in goal.

“I played wing-forward, when O'Donoghue pucked out the ball, we knew where it was coming. We had a signal. Tony Wall taking a free on the half-back line, he did that (taps his leg) just before the free with his right leg if it was coming down to me.

“We had a signal for every ball. Now for a team that trains for 60 or 70 nights a year, that's not too much to expect is it?”

So Keating instilled belief and conviction into the Tipperary system. When the Munster famine famously ended in 1987 the blue and gold outfit re-emerged as a respected force.

Drama was never too far from the equation when Cork and Tipperary collided - that was certainly the case in 1991 down by the banks of the Lee.

With Nicky English in his glorious pomp Tipp had delivered in Croke Park in 1989. Suddenly the blue and gold team were feeling very good about themselves in Munster.

The provincial decider of 1990 saw Tipperary enter as the warmest of favourites. In Semple Stadium Mark Foley had a game for the ages rifling 2-7, while John Fitzgibbon plundered another couple of goals.

That was the story of the summer and the script was maintained into September. Cork rattled the Galway net five times to complete a daring double for the county and Teddy McCarthy, especially.

Fast forward into the Munster showpiece of 1991. Tipperary had scores to settle. Cork were primed to build on the success of 1990. A fascinating battle unfolded at Pairc Ui Chaoimh.

The second instalment in Thurles was equally gripping. When Cork and Tipperary clashed in 1991 it was a story of class, comebacks, and character.