Coming off the back of last weekend's defeat to Dublin, it's fair to say that Galway hurling is in a fairly grim place at the moment.
They are a county which always have All-Ireland aspirations, even if they have only claimed Liam MacCarthy this century. However, such ambitions seem a long way off as things stand.
Galway certainly could not argue that they deserved to advance from the Leinster round robin, even if there was a hint of controversy surrounding the red card they received during that decisive loss to Dublin. Henry Shefflin's men did not perform well against any of the counties that came ahead of them and can have no complaints with a fourth-placed finish.
The team now looks set to undergo a major rebuild, something that is perhaps one or two years overdue.
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Joe Canning has theory on why Galway golden generation has struggled
A number of stalwarts in the Galway squad are likely to retire this year, opening the door for some new faces to cement their place in the side.
The county have had some very strong underage teams in recent years, most notably their minors who won four All-Irelands on the spin from 2017-2020. However, not many of those players have managed to establish themselves at senior level up to this point.
Writing in the Irish Times, Joe Canning presented his theory on why so few of those players have managed to make the breakthrough up to this point.
Athletic development is absolutely critical. Going back the years did all the young players have that foundation? I don’t think so.
Lukas Kirszenstein was in charge of strength and conditioning for all Galway hurling teams for a number of years but I know when Jeff Lynskey was manager at minor and under-20 level he wasn’t following Lukas’ strength and conditioning programmes.
Those programmes would have been designed to help the younger players make the jump to senior in time.
A lack of long-term thinking when it came to the strength and conditioning of those Galway underage stars would certainly have had an impact on their ability to adapt to senior inter-county hurling.
Regardless of what has gone wrong in recent years, the county will need those younger players to step up if they are to experience any sort of success over the coming seasons.
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