Tipperary's 16 point humbling at the hands of Galway in the league decider brought the All-Ireland champions back down to earth, according to manager Michael Ryan.

"Kudos to Galway, outstanding team on the day," he remarked to The Irish Independent.

"I think we would have been stretched to our absolute limits to live with them even had we turned up."

Ryan continued: "I was talking to some friends (saying) it's almost as if the bubble burst and the honeymoon ended. We almost could do no wrong which was never the case. We live in mere mortal land.

"We make plenty of mistakes, we're always trying to improve but we're not the finished article and we never professed to be."

It goes without saying that the All-Ireland winning manager and his backroom team will demand serious improvement from their players ahead of Sunday's Munster SHC quarter-final date with Cork.

"We're looking to move up the gears considerably as is every other team in the country. The Tipperary performance, the levels that we were at on league finals day, versus where we need to be when we meet Cork in Thurles on Sunday, will need to be different.

"It was a general malaise. It was all over the pitch. There were fellas not reaching the levels we had hoped to reach. We simply weren't ready for the challenge that Galway brought. They (Galway) were, in comparison, absolutely 100 per cent ready.

"They were playing to a completely different beat compared to what we were able to reach on the day."

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