All-star Jamie Barron has emerged as an injury concern as Waterford gear up for the start of the Munster Senior hurling Championship on Sunday afternoon.
The Déise take on Clare in the Provincial Quarter-Final at Semple Stadium with Tipperary facing the winners a week later in the last four.
Barron who won his third all-star last season picked up a leg injury in training last Friday night, Déise manager Liam Cahill spoke to WLR Sport at last night's press briefing in Fraher Field:
"Yeah, just something he picked up last Friday night in training, we were playing good intense hurling. we were working hard on our hurling and 'twas fairly intense. He just gave a little tweak to a muscle in his leg and that's the way it is, that's what happens. When fellas are conditioned like that and finely tuned, these things come about and we just have to get in behind it now and try and get it looked after and get in fixed, and if Jamie is not available for Sunday, hopefully we'll get him back on the field of play as quick as possible."
The Fourmilewater man picked up the man of the match award in last year's All-Ireland Quarter-Final between the same two counties at Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
The Waterford manager also expressed concern about his captain Conor Prunty who came off at half-time with a quad injury in the Tipperary victory two weeks ago, Cahill said:
"We have a couple of concerns, Conor Prunty being one (our captain) and it's strange really - it's our captain and vice-captain Jamie Barron as well but we're going to give them every opportunity now. They're being well looked after, the people that are working with them are well equipped and I've good trust in them people to get these players right and I'll be lead and said by what our team physio, Paddy Julian says and his support guys with him as well as to whether or not the boys will be fit for Sunday but we'll give them every chance as the week progresses."
Our Senior Hurling and Senior Football Managers speaking this evening at our press evening in Fraher Field ahead of this weekends Munster Championship games!#deiseabú pic.twitter.com/SuFcE0AwAa
— Waterford GAA (@WaterfordGAA) June 22, 2021
Former hurler of the year Austin Gleeson and Shane Fives also limped off during the Tipperary win, but Cahill says both players are making good progress:
"Yeah they're progressing well, they trained well on Sunday and we hope to get through a fairly lively training session again tonight and yeah they're all in a good place thankfully so just the two in question really (Jamie and Conor) and hopefully we'll come through the next bit of work we do and we'll be all ready for Sunday."
It promises to be an intriguing battle in the Field of Legends as the 2021 Munster Championship begins in earnest, we'll have live coverage from Thurles on Sunday afternoon, join Kieran O'Connor and Eoin Murphy from 3:15pm on WLR, thanks to George Corbett Skoda.
