Maybe a dose of controversy was just what the Allianz Hurling League needed this week.
The hurling league has struggled for relevance in recent years against its more self-important football counterpart.
This trend has been exacerbated this year by all the intrigue surrounding Gaelic football's grand rules experiment, which has hogged so much airtime that pundits barely have the scope to explore more mundane matters like 'who'll win this one, Whelo?'
The initial TV snub of Cork-Limerick was just what was required to get hurling people going. The surprise was that it hit so early in the year.
Our colleagues at Liveline usually have this controversy provisionally marked in their calendar for early April. When GAAGO is broadcasting exclusive coverage of Cork and Tipperary drawing 6-22 apiece in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, while those relying on terrestrial are watching Monaghan beat Fermanagh 1-10 to 0-08 in the Ulster preliminary round.
(Editor's note: The fact that only two Munster round-robin games are fixed for GAAGO's traditional Saturday slot may upset the plans of Joe Duffy and co. in 2025.)
The threatened blackout became quite the furore. The brew was strengthened by the unwitting involvement of a certain rival sport. Cork's insistence that they didn't want to make their supporters choose between a home game against Limerick and the Ireland-England rugby international provoked some derision among the hurling diehards.
In the end, a solution was arrived at. TG4 are streaming the game online, while broadcasting Donegal-Dublin on the main channel.
All's well that ended well, except for those demographics who are still far out of their comfort zone when operating the Google machine.
Meanwhile, the efforts of some of my colleagues in RTÉ to explain that they are contractually bound not to show an Allianz League game in direct competition with TG4 in the 7.30 slot - hence the initial request to see if throw-in could be moved to 6pm - are going about as well as you might expect. Which is to say that the people doing the explaining are mostly p***ing into the wind.
The game itself sees John Kiely's side make their opening bow in the league, having had their bye-week in Round 1. They take on a Cork outfit who are full of beans after demolishing poor Wexford last week, the hosts having spent their winter hitting send on retirement emails.
Theoretically, the hurling league should be at least a smidgen more spicy and cut-throat this time around. The elite counties are becoming re-acquainted with the possibility of relegation after a few years on easy street.
Division 1A and 1B are no longer a randomised jumble of teams but are once again streamed in order of performance. Though the powers-that-be are still clinging to the '1B' nomenclature, presumably so as not to damage the self-esteem of those in the second tier.
The old format never recovered its credibility from the 2022 season, when every team who performed well in the league flopped come championship and every team who experimented/barely broke into a gallop in the league had a fine, long summer.
Twelve months later, pundits were minded to heed the words of Pete Townsend and their every utterance on the league was layered with caveats, coming accompanied with the disclaimer that you should probably be disregarding all in truth.
Having reviewed some drab, tippy-tappy encounter on League Sunday, they would look ahead to next week and remark hopefully, "I think they'll be targeting that one, Joanne."
The exception to all this is Liam Cahill, who remains stubbornly uninterested in the idea that letting rip in the league carries a cost down the line.
Nonetheless, it's worth noting that the last two league champions wound up winning the All-Ireland, so maybe the old format wasn't giving such a bum steer after all.
It is, however, true to say that both Limerick and Clare were slightly below their usual standard in the Munster round robins in 2023 and 2024 respectively. Limerick did still manage to win the Munster title in 2023, of course, though they came alarmingly close to being knocked out in the round robin prior to that.
This year, for the first time since 2020, Limerick begin the year without Liam MacCarthy on a lap of the county.
In an echo of Kilkenny's failed five-in-a-row bid, they never looked as imperious until right before their fall. Just as Brian Cody's team had demolished Cork with ease in the 2010 All-Ireland semi-final, Limerick had won their sixth Munster title on the trot with greater comfort than most of the others.
Kilkenny reacted by winning the next two All-Ireland titles and four of the next five. Limerick have the players to follow suit, although with many having miles on the clock, squad depth could be more of an issue.
Kiely's side were always contrasted with the Dublin football team of the late 2010s, in that they were heavily reliant on the same core group of players, with relatively minimal turnover.
Whereas the average age of the Dublin team famously dipped over the course of Jim Gavin's tenure, the spine of the great Limerick team is now hitting its late-20s.
Significantly, they are without Nickie Quaid for the season, the three-time All-Star laid low with a cruciate ligament.
Declan Hannon, the most successful captain in the history of hurling, is gone from the role, with Cian Lynch taking over duties. This has been interpreted as evidence that the 32-year-old Hannon is no longer assured of his place in the team, following a shaky performance in July's All-Ireland semi-final.
In better news, Peter Casey - having recovered from his horror injury against Waterford - Barry Nash and Darragh O'Donovan are back available, albeit none are in the squad tonight as Kiely takes the chance to go with a more experimental line-up.
Cork, whose wait for Liam has now entered an unprecedented 20th year, are gunning for it after the heartbreak of last summer. Depth certainly isn't an issue for Pat Ryan, who has options galore as the All-Ireland Under-20 winning teams of 2020, 2021 and 2023 continue to develop.
It may be phony war in the grand scheme of things but the dust-up of last week shows this fixture can steal the limelight, no matter the time of year.
Listen to the RTÉ GAA Podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Watch Allianz League Sunday from 9.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player. Follow a live blog on all matches on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app. Listen to updates around the country on Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
