Tony Browne says Waterford "are as well positioned as anyone" to win next year's All-Ireland senior hurling championship.

Having finished a runner-up himself in 2008, Na Deise legend Browne was understandably "shattered" to witness Derek McGrath's charges outfought during Sunday's decider at Croke Park but he believes they can put the experience to telling use and bounce back in 2018:

"In Waterford, we now have to get back and bank on this experience. Of course it won't be easy. As Derek McGrath said in his post-match interviews, getting to an All-Ireland is very, very tough. But I think now in Waterford we've to start looking at it a bit more positively," he writes in The Irish Examiner.

"It'll be just as hard if not harder for everyone else to get back to a final. I said it on the TV just before the game, this final was already an appetiser for the 2018 championship. The likes of Clare and Limerick must be champing to bring the kind of freshness to the All-Ireland stage that Waterford and Galway did this year.

"Cork will want a crack of it. And Tipp. And Kilkenny. And Wexford. And Dublin too; a team relegated down to Division 1B tends to bounce back well these years. It'll be an absolute minefield. But Waterford are as well positioned as anyone to get back and actually win it. It still has the youth and the talent. Now it has the scars and experience. That's a pretty formidable formula."

Tweet

Most Read Stories