Limerick beat Waterford by 0-19 to 1-7 at the Gaelic Grounds tonight to seal their place in the last four of the Munster minor hurling championship.
The winners will now meet Clare in Ennis on June 28th for a place in the provincial final, with Tipperary and Cork contesting the second semi-final the following day. Trounced in their previous two outings in the competition, the Suirsiders gave a better account of themselves in this second play-off but are nevertheless the first team to exit. They managed just eight scores over the hour tonight, with Billy Power hitting five of those.
Limerick opened and closed the first half with runs of four unanswered scores to lead by 0-9 to 1-2 at the interval. Midfielder Rory Duff (within ten seconds of throw-in), Paul O'Brien, Ronan Connolly and Dylan O'Shea registered the first four scores inside five minutes but it was a stop-start game that failed to ignite, with centre forward and Mungret St Paul's clubman O'Brien finishing as top scorerwith a haul of 0-10, nine of which came from frees.
Three points in as many minutes had given John Mulqueen's men - beaten in a pulsating quarter-final by the Premier County on April 5th (4-15 to 2-18) - a dream start. Na Deise were also second best (against the Banner County) in their quarter-final that night and subsequently lost to Cork earlier this month before being presented with a third shot at reaching the last four of a protracted five-team competition.
But the Treaty County's solid start had the visitors chasing the game from the off tonight and four points were shared before Waterford No.14 and captain Thomas Douglas (who also struck the crossbar early in the second half, with the game delicately poised) netted from a penalty seven minutes from the break to tie the scores up for the first and only time, 0-5 to 1-2. However, the hosts then reeled off four more unanswered points to turn around with a tidy cushion, O'Brien slotting three frees and O'Shea pointing his second from play.
The sides traded the first ten points upon the restart as the home team maintained their four-point lead with three-quarters of the game played, 0-14 to 1-7. And the Shannonsiders bossed the final quarter, clipping over five more points without reply to prevail by nine in the end. O'Shea, David Woulfe (2), Connolly and O'Brien (from frees) did the second-half scoring for the comfortable victors, who looked understandably sluggish after five weeks without a game.
So, three away defeats have seen James Lacey's lads eliminated, while Limerick are now within an hour of a fifth successive Munster final appearance.
Limerick - D Heffernan; C Flahive, C Nicholas, C Barry; M O'Brien, J Boylan, D Minehan (0-1); M O'Grady, R Duff (0-1); P O'Riordan, P O'Brien (0-10, 8f, 1'65), D Woulfe (0-2); D O'Shea (0-4), R Connolly (0-1), R Tobin. Subs: B O'Grady for M O'Brien, E Sheehan for P O'Riordan, J Ryan for R Duff, C Carroll for R Tobin.
Waterford - E Browne; D Booth, M Noonan, T Foley; M Power, T Barron, L O'Brien; S Whelan Barrett, E Cullen; C Whelan, I Daly, I Beecher (0-2); T Looby, T Douglas (1-0pen), B Power (0-5, 2f). Subs: J Devine for C Whelan, M O'Keeffe for T Looby, S Carton for T Douglas, E McGrath for B Power, K Bennett for I Beecher.
Referee - J McCormack.
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