Blink and you'll miss it.
Sometimes in the GAA you just have to sit back, listen to the crack of the hurl and wonder why. Sensibly the Croke Park powers have listened to the grass roots and made winning the Christy Ring Cup a worthwhile exercise. The carrot, of playing with the big boys in the Liam McCarthy Cup, is now there for all in tier two to hurl for.
But before you know it the Christy Ring will be decided and all before the summer has got going. It is still early days in the 2009 GAA Championship, but already I have been at a quarter-final of an All-Ireland competition.
Albeit it was of a lower quality than most of the rest of the hurling stable this summer. Saturday's game was none-the-less a big game in the scheme of things. Carlow are the coming force from tier two of hurling and John Greene has them singing a pretty tune, which overpowered a tired looking Kildare side. Details from my report are here.
They lack that killer first touch and ruthless streak to put away a team, but Carlow - at the minute - are the best of the rest in terms of hurling in Ireland. They have a semi on June 6th and then the final a week later - if it doesn't clash with an Ulster Hurling Championship game.
The Christy Ring Cup will be all over before Christy Cooney has had to field his first questions on the Kilkenny dominance. But who will care? Carlow, most likely, will be celebrating back-to-back titles, but it won't be enough when they have to wait until the 'real' action is over to find out if they make it to hurling nirvana.
The GAA are - by nature - a confusing organisation at times, so here is a decent run down of how the hurling championship pans out for the summer
