21 years ago Nicky Brennan delivered a passionate speech about the state of hurling at the GAA's annual congress.

The 1994 annual get-together was also held at the Slieve Russell Hotel in Cavan  and, as Kilkenny chairman, Brennan warned that hurling was 'in crisis'.

Looking back now he's glad to say that the small ball code has come a long way.

"I didn't expect my comments would get the reaction they did," he said to The Irish Independent.

"I was on a hurling sub-committee, chaired by the late Tommy Barrett, and we had worked hard to get a feeling of where hurling was at around the country, not so much in Tier 1 but further down the line.

"It was a quiet enough Congress so I decided to paint a fairly graphic picture. I didn't in any way change the sense of what we had found out from talking to various people around the country but I suppose I did sensationalise the facts to some degree.

"'Hurling in crisis' was always going to attract attention, which was the aim because we needed to look at the game across the board."

He continued:  "There's no comparison between then and now in terms of standards. That's no reflection on the past - it's just that the modern game has moved on in the same way as all sports have," he said.

"Having said that, it would be good if we had the sort of All-Ireland title spread that hurling enjoyed in the 1980s and 1990s.

"You'd like to see a greater spread and you probably would have if Kilkenny hadn't produced such an incredible amount of talent over such a long period.

"Still, I have no doubt that, overall, hurling a whole is in a much better place now than it was in 1994."

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