GAELIC GAMES: SO THE stage was swept clear and summer started in Semple Stadium. Cork and Tipp hurling on a Sunday afternoon at the cusp of June with the sun blazing down on their backs and the tension crackling in the close air.

“Pulsating! Rip-roaring!” said Tipp manager Liam Sheedy, quietly assessing the game in the cool of the tunnel afterwards. Few in the attendance of just over 35,000 would disagree. The game held its audience in place to the end.

Tipperary squeaked through to a Munster semi-final against Clare in three weeks’ time and in the end were mighty glad to do so.

A win, and a moderately comfortable win, was the least which had been expected of them. They achieved their aim showing flashes of the inspiration they will need this summer.

Cork by contrast came to us allegedly jaded and distracted by their winter of discontent and were expected to be easy pickings. Again and again through the last few years this team has evinced the qualities of the men they couldn’t hang.

They didn’t slip through the gallows floor yesterday either.

So the game ended as that rare thing in high-stakes sport. Tipperary won. Cork lost. Both sides saw enough of what they want to become to drive them back to the training ground with renewed vigour next week.

Tipp the young pretenders, for whom an All-Ireland final appearance is almost an imperative, saw off their oldest rivals for the second season in succession. Cork, though, showed enough signs of life and resurgent form to suggest they will be a force when the championship field narrows to eight teams later in the summer.

Tipp played with a breeze in the first half and the confidence that comes from being the team that have gone closest to Kilkenny in a big match in recent times.

For a period in the first half when Cork’s effort fell away noticeably Tipp drove home the advantage, coldly stretching their lead to six points as a run of seven scores was interrupted by just a Ben O’Connor free.

It’s not how often you get knocked down, though, but how often you get up and Cork were back to within four points by the time the break came. They had a breeze on their backs for the second half. The game teetered on a knife edge.

“We felt good enough at half-time,” said Cork manager Denis Walsh who was taking charge for his first championship game, “in that the breeze was going to take the ball straight into the full-forward line a lot of the time. The chances were there. At this level you must take them.”

Tipp had the confidence though. They burgled a deflected goal through Séamus Callanan almost immediately upon the restart and even if that was the score which lit the fuse on a spirited Cork revival, it was also the score which won the game.

Cork never came closer than when Timmy McCarthy had the ball in the net for a Cork goal five minutes later, but referee Barry Kelly called play back for a penalty. Pat Horgan’s penalty was saved at the expense of a 65 by Brendan Cummins. Cork failed to cash in that award.

“It comes to breaks,” said Sheedy. “The ball being called back for a penalty; Brendan saving the penalty and then Cork driving the 65 wide. That was a turning point but it didn’t stop Cork coming back again! We went at one stage from seven points up to one point and hanging on.”

Both sides were fielding young players making debuts in key positions and in the crucible of Thurles they all did well. Pádraig Maher reprised his league final form while Noel McGrath gave flashes of the ability that places him among the top few emerging players in the country.

Cork’s full-back line experienced a lot of pressure especially in the first half and things only got worse when Shane O’Neill had to leave the field after an ugly collision, but they held up well with fine performances from Conor O’Sullivan and Eoin Cadogan who won the man-of-the-match award.

And at the other end of the park was the slightly exotic 6ft 7in figure of Aisake Ó hAilpín, whose height and coltish athleticism were a constant worry to Tipp. He scored a point from play, paid his way by being pulled down for a few frees and almost set Pat Horgan up for a goal at a crucial moment in the second half. Horgan drove wide just as the Cork hordes at the far end had leaped into the air in presumptive celebration.

The summer is young yet and the pack behind Kilkenny has yet to coalesce into a coherent shape. Yesterday gave us a hint of how August might be flavoured though. Old cowboys sharpening their sights. Young blades whetting their edge. The sun was going down and the shadows growing long by the time the dust had settled in the old field.

Hurling is back.