Bonner Maher sees no summer sag in Liam Cahill's methods
It's been a nagging criticism of Liam Cahill's teams over the years, that they burn a little too brightly in winter and spring, only to fade out in the summer.
Hurling pundit Brian Carroll went in hard on the issue last January after reports of Cahill's Tipperary panel engaging in spartan winter training.
"This is year six of Liam Cahill doing the same thing over and over again on repeat," claimed Carroll. "It's like, dog them in the winter, take it really seriously during the league, and then they run out of steam come June."
Tipp did contest this year's league final, standing up Carroll's argument somewhat, but, crucially, their form hasn't dipped in the Championship.
They're even breaking new ground of sorts, stringing together three wins in a row in the Championship for the first time since winning the All-Ireland in 2019.
And if they beat Galway on Saturday evening, they'll be through to a first semi-final in six years. No signs then of any summer slippage.
"The way the Championship is in Munster, you're trying to peak early because Munster is so competitive," said three-time All-Ireland winner Patrick Bonner Maher who played under Cahill last year before retiring.
"I wouldn't believe that (criticism) at all. I would have always thought we were in fairly good shape and I wouldn't have seen it petering out, so I can't really comment on that myself. I certainly wouldn't have seen it."
Cahill addressed the criticism himself when talking to reporters after Tipp's league win over Kilkenny last March.
"People say Tipperary under Liam Cahill will win matches in the spring but can they do it in the summer?" noted Cahill. In a separate interview, he said people think that Cahill 'kills them in training and has them flogged to death before the Championship' comes around.
The former Tipp underage guru said the reality last year, when they failed to get out of the Munster group, was that they actually 'hadn't enough work done'.
Maher noted that Tipp 'went hard at it early this year and the fruits of that are being shown now' with last weekend's preliminary quarter-final demolition of Laois setting up the Galway date.
So were Tipp undercooked last year, as Cahill suggested?
"I'm not 100 percent sure," shrugged Maher. "Looking back on it now, it's easy to pick out things that could possibly have gone wrong or left us short. We would have felt we were fairly fit."
Tipp looked fresh and fully tuned in when putting 3-32 on the board against Laois last Saturday. Their challenge now is to maintain that high energy rate and to avoid a repeat of their 2023 quarter-final defeat to Galway. They were coming off a big preliminary quarter-final win back then too.
"I remember that game down in Limerick, we were fully primed," said Maher. "One or two things just went against us, goals went against us, and it just deflated us on the day."
Bonner, 35, will look on this time as an interested spectator. After 16 years as a Tipp senior, he's content with the decision he made to step away.
"The body is very good thankfully," he said. "I'm playing a good bit of golf, training away, running away."
He's busy at work too, with an EV charging company having finished up with the Irish Army.
"I actually found out I was a coeliac," he explained of his departure from the army. "You can't serve in the army being a coeliac so I was medically discharged. I was lucky that I had my degree and masters to fall back on. It kind of pivoted my direction. That's where I'm at."
* Former Tipperary hurler Patrick Bonner Maher was speaking at the launch of the 2025 Electric Ireland All-Ireland minor championships.
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