SATURDAY 16 JULY
Glen Dimplex All-Ireland Camogie Championship semi-finals
Limerick v Waterford, 3.15pm, FBD Semple Stadium
Dublin v Kilkenny, 5.30pm, FBD Semple Stadium
ONLINE
Live score updates, with live tracker on Dublin v Kilkenny, on RTÉ.ie and the RTÉ News Now app.
TV
RTÉ2 coverage of the two quarter-final ties begin at 3pm.
RADIO
Saturday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1 will have live updates.
WEATHER
A mainly dry day with just isolated showers possible. Warm with highest temperatures of 21 to 26 degrees, warmest in central parts, with a light to moderate southerly breeze. For more go to met.ie.
Munster rivals on a roll
This tie pits two teams against one another that recovered from subdued starts to build real momentum, including having to pull out all the stops in the final game of the round-robin series to make it through.
While Waterford are old hands at this stage, there have been a lot of changes in personnel from when they made the initial breakthrough under the stewardship of Donal O'Rourke in 2018.
Having three different management set-ups in three seasons hasn’t helped continuity but Derek Lyons is in his second term now and has brought a good blend of youth and experience to the Déise.
Beth Carton, Niamh Rockett and captain Lorraine Bray are All-Stars, while Brianna O’Regan is acknowledged as a brilliant shot-stepper and among the premier goalies in the land.
Abby Flynn is really beginning to make her presence felt now having been handed her debut by Fergal O’Brien as a teenager, while Mairéad O’Brien and Clodagh Carroll are other youngsters who have made major contributions through the summer.
Limerick have had even more significant turnover in recent years, navigating not just the retirement of one of their greatest players Niamh Mulcahy after they last reached the quarter-final, in 2019, but also the unavailability of a number of other talented operators for a variety of reasons.
John Lillis stepped up as manager this year having been a selector under Pat Ryan. The former Tipp boss also brought in Declan Nash, himself an ex-Limerick boss.
The league was a disaster and they were relegated to Division 2 with a whimper, losing by 13 points to Offaly in the play-off. In the circumstances, having to face Galway and Kilkenny in the first two games of the championship was hardly ideal and they lost both on an aggregate score of 5-32 to 1-13.
A rematch with Offaly was next up and chiselling out a two-point victory over the midlanders flicked the switch for Limerick as they accounted for Down before leaving Dunloy with the vital victory over Antrim to claim their last-six berth.
Limerick: C Keating, S Woulfe, M Creamer, M Quaid (capt), M Ryan, S O’Callaghan, N Curtin, A Larkin, N Ryan, M Curtin, R Delee, C Costelloe, C Lyons, L McCarthy, S O’Brien.
Subs: C Mulqueen, A Coughlan, A Nelligan, E Kennedy, C Brennan, E Harrington, E Doolan, A Morrissey, L Boylan, N White, C Ryan, O Kelleher, L Fennelly, T Dore, L O’Neill.
Waterford: B O’Regan, K Corbett Barry, I Heffernan, M Power, O Hickey, C Carroll, A Landers, L Bray (capt), C Griffin, A Flynn, B Carton, M O’Brien, R Walsh, R Kirwan, N Rockett.
Subs: M Foran, S Lacey, T Power, C O’Sullivan, A O’Sullivan, A Hartley, H Flynn, E Curran, A Gallagher, A Mackintosh, C Farrelly, V O’Brien.
Cats and Dublin aiming to answer questions
There were many murmurings about Kilkenny at the beginning of the championship, with two all-time great talents of the game having retired in Davina Tobin and Collette Dormer and another defender and totemic figure, Meighan Farrell, taking the year out to go travelling.
This remember, not long after Kilkenny had seen Anne Dalton and Anna Farrell walk into the sunset. Meanwhile, the Doyle sisters Aoife and Kellyann and Niamh Deely have been ruled out with injury, Kellyann Doyle falling foul of the dreaded cruciate curse a third time.
With that in mind, their performance in forcing Galway to need an injury-time equaliser to snatch a draw and top spot in the group on score difference spoke volumes for the spirit in the camp, the leadership of Denise Gaule, Grace Walsh, Miriam Walsh and Claire Phelan, the impact of newbies Tiffany Fitzgerald, Michaela Kenneally and Aoife Prendergast and the coaching prowess of Brian Dowling, Tommy Shefflin and co.
The return to the fray of Julieanne Malone after a few years out of the scene has been influential too.
Dublin have been the great puzzle of camogie with huge potential in terms of the club game and a booming population but an inability to find consistency.
Like a few teams, they weren’t helped by the constant chopping and changing of managements after David Herity moved on. The former Kilkenny All-Ireland winner steered Dublin to the All-Ireland semi-final in 2017 and was in charge when they last reached this stage of proceedings 12 months later.
Adrian O’Sullivan has had time to erect building blocks since taking over as boss with incremental improvements visible throughout his term.
With stars of the 2017 campaign such as captain Hannah Hegarty, Aisling Maher, Emma Flanagan and Ali Twomey on-field generals, and enthusiastic operators of the calibre of Niamh Gannon, the Couch siblings, Gaby and Jody, and Issy Davis around them, and a potential superstar of the code in Aisling O’Neill announcing herself in the midst of her Leaving Cert, they have returned to the top six.
They made their mark immediately when taking Waterford’s scalp at Walsh Park before being held to a draw by Tipperary. They were right on Cork’s coattails for a long way before the Rebels pulled away to win by seven but then let a five-point lead slip to finish with a share of the spoils against Clare.
That left them vulnerable in an extremely tight Group 1 and trailing Wexford at the interval, their aspirations hung by a thread. O’Sullivan made some astute switches and the players responded with four goals, including two from Davis, and the subsequent nine-point victory secured them the coveted quarter-final berth due to having a better score difference than Tipperary.
Dublin: E Mooney, R Baker, E O’Brien, M Kelleher, C Nicoletti, H Hegarty (capt), E O’Byrne, L Butler, G Couch, E Flanagan, N Gannon, J Couch, E Jamieson-Murphy, A O’Neill, A Maher.
Subs: C Tierney, A Gannon, A Twomey, A Timothy, A Heffernan, A Walsh, A Whelan, C Shanahan, C Buchanan, C Gannon, E Young, I Davis, K Finnegan, N Heffernan, O Gray.
Kilkenny: A Norris, M Teehan, G Walsh, M Bambrick, T Fitzgerald, Claire Phelan, L Murphy, S Fitzgerald, K Power, M Walsh, D Gaule, K Nolan, J Malone, M O’Connell, M Kenneally.
Subs: E Kavanagh, A Prendergast (capt), Ciara Phelan, A McHardy, N Deely, S Dwyer, S Crowley, L Fennelly, S O’Keeffe, A Curtis, R Breen, C O’Keeffe, D Quigley, C Comerford, M Corcoran.
On Saturday Limerick and Waterford, Kilkenny and Dublin will battle it out for All-Ireland Camogie Championship semi-final spots, with both games to be screened live on @RTE2 and the @RTEplayer #RTEgaa pic.twitter.com/zztKtrkXJ6
— RTÉ GAA (@RTEgaa) July 15, 2022
Watch the All-Ireland Camogie quarter-finals on Saturday, Limerick v Waterford (3.15pm), Dublin v Kilkenny (5.30pm), live on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player. Follow live blog on RTÉ News app and on rte.ie/sport.
