Derek McGrath's commitment to the Deise cause can't be questioned.

The Waterford manager is leaving no stone unturned in his preparations for the 2015 season as they attempt play catch up on their Munster rivals.

"We're putting in 60 hours a week, all of us, me as a manager and the selection committee," McGrath said to The Examiner.

"We're trying to get it going in the right direction and your conscience is clear when you're doing as much as that.

"I feel justified by the amount of hours I'm putting into it.

"We're doing our absolute best under the particular set of circumstances at present. If somebody else benefits from it in a couple of years' time that could be the way it turns out but so be it.

"I heard someone making the point recently that the word 'transition' doesn't exist in sport. I genuinely think there has been a charge of the guard as regards senior players in the set-up.

"We would feel as a selection committee that the process for the fellas we've brought into the panel to be ready for inter-county hurling needs to begin now rather than two or three years' time.

"A lot of people would have said to me before I took the job, 'Oh, wait. In two or three years' time, the (2013 All-Ireland winning) minors will be coming to 21 and 22 years of age and you'll be right then'.

"The cute advice would have been to stay away from the job for two or three years, not because it was a poisoned chalice but people felt the team would not be ready until then.

"But I think that's an insult to the experience we still have in the squad in terms of Michael Walsh, Kevin Moran, Shane Fives, Ian O'Regan, Shane O'Sullivan. We still have a lot of experience.

"We are where we are not because of me or the players. But it's the reality. The other teams are probably a bit ahead of us and the Waterford people won't thank me for saying that."

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