ONE of Sunday's most interesting National Hurling League fixtures will be the Division Two clash between two of the early front-runners, Waterford and Cork, at Pairc Ui Rinn. Both counties have extracted full points from their matches to date and have emphasised their credentials as favourites to make a quick return to the top division.

The occasion has added interest because Waterford have engaged the services of former Cork All-Ireland winning captain and trainer, Gerald McCarthy. He will be up against his old county colleague and St Finbarr's clubmate Jimmy Barry Murphy, now in charge of Cork.

Already the counties have met on a couple of occasions in the pre-League Oireachtas and South-East League competitions. Waterford hold the edge, having beaten Cork in Dungarvan and drawn with them in Pairc Ui Rinn.

"The game will tell both counties a lot more about themselves," says McCarthy, "and we are looking forward to it. I always felt that Waterford have had very good quality hurlers but weren't getting the results for the quality that was there. It's a process of learning for a lot of the players.

"The talent is there but they have to learn that there's more to hurling than talent. There's application and discipline and those things haven't always been there and that's the sort of thing I've been working on."

Waterford's mercurial nature is fairly common knowledge. In recent years, the county has done well at under-age levels, reaching a minor All-Ireland final and win the All-Ireland under-21 title five years ago. The development hasn't gone smoothly and the years since have been marked with some terrible summer results, accommodating Kerry's first championship win since the 1920s and then getting a less historic but nonetheless painful thrashing from Tipperary.

The talent that helped capture the under-21 title has been unevenly applied to the task of breaking through at senior level.

"I wouldn't say the playing pool is by average standard's quite god," says McCarthy, "but we are still hit hard by injuries. For Sunday we're short Fergal Hartley (broken bone in wrist) and Stephen Frampton (ditto in ankle) and that's a huge loss. But we're particularly happy with the players we've brought in. Brian Greene has slotted in at wing back on his return from the US."

The dual loss remains serious. Hartley and Frampton, together with Munster Railway Cup winner Tony Browne, form the half-back line which has been the outstanding sector of the team.

The two injured player's also featured in county champions Ballygunner's run to the Munster club final before Christmas when they were beaten by a point in a thrilling match with Clare's Wolfe "Tones Off the half-backs were the launchpad for Ballygunner's memorable second-half comeback, the strike weapon was Paul Flynn, whose 2-4 (2-3 from play) pulled the Waterford team back from a 112-point deficit to within a point of the eventual winners.

Flynn's exploitation of a phenomenal individual talent, had previously been too distracted by petulance to merit even the euphemistic description of `enigmatic'. But that day in Thurles after an ominously peripheral first half, he showed spirit and craft in rebuilding the team's challenge.

"Paul is applying himself very, very hard in training," says McCarthy, "but he doesn't always do it in matches. His concentration can waver and we're trying to get him working for a full hour. He's a great talent but getting the best out of it is one of the great imponderables

"I would say in general we've been disappointed with the forwards but then we've done very little hurling to date. It's been mostly physical training and I wasn't really expecting an improvement in the hurling. Fitness was mixed. The Ballygunner fellas were fairly fit but some of the others had a fair bit to do."

The county's first-round championship match is against All-Ireland finalists Limerick but McCarthy's short and medium term goals concern the League. "We set ourselves the target of getting back to Division One. We're taking the League very seriously and the changes (to the hurling calendar) have worked for us.

"The South-East League (played before Christmas) was a godsend and helped us look at some of the new players in the panel. It's a long, hard battle but overall I'm very happy with the commitment and the team spirit has shown a big improvement."