Cork v Waterford

LET’S hope that the decision taken in the committee room of the Disputes Resolution Authority in the early hours of Friday morning won’t have an over-bearing influence on this game.

The fact that Tadhg de Búrca has played every possible minute of championship hurling that he could under Derek McGrath illustrates how important he is.

Darragh Fives will slot into De Búrca’s role pretty seamlessly, but it will mean losing his drive and energy further up the field.

If Waterford are to redress their poor semi-final record – just one win in 12 semifinal appearances since 1998 – they will need Austin Gleeson to re-discover his Hurler of the Year form and will need more of a return from their forwards as an unit.

It will be interesting to see how Cork do with their spare man, Mark Ellis will probably fulfil that role, and how their impressive youngsters like Mark Coleman, Luke Meade and Darragh Fitzgibbon deal with the experience of a first Championship game in Croke Park. It is different out there and young players can freeze.

Even without De Búrca, the feeling here is that Derek McGrath and Dan Shanahan will come up with a plan to get past Cork. They are the more experienced of the two teams and they seem to be slowly coming to their peak later in the summer this year.

Teams don’t get always get what they deserve, but there is a sense that McGrath and this Waterford team deserve to reach at least one All-Ireland final.

Driven on by the sense of injustice that they De Búrca is absent, we expect Waterford to edge this.

Verdict: Waterford