Gaelic Football has lately been subject to much debate as to what to do with the weaker - sorry - so-called weaker counties.
This year, the GAA have done what they do best in going Back To The Future in debating the introduction of a 'B' Championship for Division Four teams.
Casual followers of Gaelic Football will vaguely remember the GAA have tried this before: in 2004 they introduced the Tommy Murphy Cup. It's success can be summarised by saying that Joe Brolly has called it the Tommy Murphy Cup.
Amid the constant wailing of tears and gnashing of teeth regarding the football structure, hurling's capacious rift between the have', the have nots, and the Longfords was addressed with the introduction of differing tournaments.
In spite of that, these sides do sometimes meet in hurling, as happened in a challenge game in aid of Little Flower National School at the weekend between Tipperary and Mary Immaculate College, who share 26 All Ireland titles together.
Given Tipperary hold the majority of those titles (all of them) the result shouldn't really surprise us:
Tipperary: 7-29
Mary Immaculate: 0-6
A 44 point win for Tipp, then.
The Tipperary Star were at the game, here are a few of the highlights from their report:
Tipperary blasted seven goals past an extremely poor Mary Immaculate College team in a senior hurling challenge match played in aid of Little Flower National School at Boherlahan on Sunday.
The lukewarm challenge from a significantly depleted Mary Immaculate College team represented poor preparation for Tipperary’s opening Allianz Hurling League Division 1A fixture against Dublin on February 13th.
The sides traded frees initially before Tipperary fired 3-20 without reply to take a 3-21 to 0-1 interval lead.
None of the Mary Immaculate forward division, nor their replacements, managed to score in this horribly lop-sided contest.
In fairness, the game was in the aid of a good cause, and thankfully for Mary Immaculate, they won't have to worry about Brendan Maher and co. often in the future.
