10 years ago - "My mates still say that they think Ger Cunningham was concussed for all three goals, but it was only the one I can tell you," says Pat Murphy, Waterford's unlikely three-goal hero of 1989. Murphy, brought in at full forward for the second half of that year's Munster hurling semi-final replay, beat Cunningham on three occasions as Waterford enjoyed a 5-16 to 4-17 success over Cork.
A relatively new and unheralded Waterford side forced a replay after the sides traded 18 points each in the first match. As usual in those days, even the draw failed to generate any interest among the Cork "not travelling until the Munster final" hurling public, and a crowd of only 15,000, mostly Waterford fans, turned up for the replay.
Pat Murphy takes up the story of his part in the day. "There were two things that day that we needed to overcome - there was this big mental block for Waterford against Cork and then there was the thing that Cork never lost replays in Munster. We weren't a highly regarded team, but Tony Mansfield had brought the organisation of the team up to a good standard.
"I was substituted in the first match and dropped for the replay - I had a bit of a back injury but I just hadn't played well - but was brought in at half-time. I scored the first goal after a minute with my first touch - and it wasn't good. Ger Cunningham was expecting a rasper but I mis-hit it. Luckily enough I mis-hit it into a corner."
Murphy's second, after 24 minutes, wasn't without its good fortune either. "It was a rebound from Ger that I scored from. He got a knock afterwards and was concussed. For the third, he got a hand to the sliotar but couldn't hold on to it and it came back to me off the crossbar, I think."
Despite Tipperary's subsequent demolition of Waterford in one of the first televised Munster finals, Murphy believes it did the young hurlers of the county some good to see them beat Cork. "It definitely gave some of the young fellows some belief and the county's under-21s beat Cork on their way to a Munster title a couple of years later."
Yesterday the bogey was back. Including the success by Jimmy Barry-Murphy's charges, Cork have now won 19 of their 22 semi-final meetings with Waterford.
20 years ago - Goal-hungry McGrath Mayo's man of the hour: Joe McGrath scored three goals as Mayo beat Leitrim 3-12 to 1-10 to reach the Connacht final. Mayo trailed by a point at half-time, but McGrath struck with two goals in the opening seven minutes of the second half. His third followed 15 minutes from the end.
30 years ago - Dublin pulverised by Kildare class:
With Jack Donnelly kicking six frees, Kildare ran out easy 0-18 to 0-7 winners of the Leinster semi-final. "As feeble a Dublin team as has worn the sky blue jersey since St Vincent's pioneered their way back into the big time for the metropolitans in those sunlight days of the '50s," was Peter Byrne's verdict on Dublin's performance in his Irish Times report.
