Gaelic Games Team news: Waterford manager Justin McCarthy has ruled out either John Mullane or Ken McGrath being fit for this weekend's Munster hurling championship semi-final against Tipperary.

It was known Mullane and Eoin Kelly, who stands suspended until July, were going to miss the match, but there had been hopes McGrath's thumb injury might respond to treatment sufficiently well to allow him to line out.

Even the news that Mullane is due to have a plate removed from his broken wrist later this week raised forlorn hopes about his participation.

"We aren't planning on having any of them for the weekend," said McCarthy yesterday.

"They are all able to train away, but John and Ken haven't been able to do any stick work. John hasn't even been able to catch a hurl and he would risk aggravating the damage if he came back too soon.

"Ken has chipped a bone in his thumb as well as cracking it and has to wear a metal brace on it. He hasn't caught a ball since the injury and I think he would need another week and a half to get it right - short of playing one-handed hurling."

The loss of three top players has created pessimism around the county, but, according to McCarthy, the team is coping well.

"It's nothing new to us. We've had a fair while to come to terms with the probability that they'd be missing. With them I feel we'd have a great chance, but we're still hopeful and will give it our best shot."

Injury news ahead of the fixture hasn't all been one way, with confirmation that Tipperary full back Philip Maher is likely to miss the match with the recurrence of a knee injury during a club match last weekend.

"He's almost certainly out," said county PRO Ed Donnelly. "It's a cartilage injury. We don't know the precise extent of it but, although it's early days yet, it doesn't look as serious as we first feared.

"It's the same knee he's had trouble with before and which forced him to miss this match last year, the semi-final against Clare in Limerick. We're hopeful he'd be back if we qualified for the Munster final."

Meanwhile, one operation that's gone smoothly ahead of the weekend is the planning for Longford's home match with Dublin in the Leinster football championship. The fixture will be Longford's first home championship fixture against Dublin and their first against anyone in seven years and is virtually sold out.

According to county chair Martin Skelly, the capacity in Pearse Park has risen to 15,500 after building work to extend terracing to all four sides of the ground.

Although Dublin have been allocated the lion's share of the tickets, Skelly said he feels the effort has been worthwhile to stage a major championship match in the town.

"We knew that to get the go-ahead for the game we'd have to make sacrifices, just as Dublin had to because they won't be able to get everyone they want in either. It's disappointing that we won't be able to let children in for free, although we have provided some family tickets.

"We haven't been able to put any tickets on general sale, but I hope that all genuine fans have been able to get them."

The distribution has seen Dublin getting 9,500 of the tickets, Longford 5,000 and the balance of 1,000 went to the Leinster Council.

Preparations have gone to plan in the town, and Skelly is optimistic the local authority will open up one lane of the nearly-completed Edgeworthstown bypass to facilitate match traffic. There are also surprising, given the relatively short distance from Dublin, numbers staying in town for the bank holiday weekend.

"There's not a bed to be got in the town. It's a chance to give something back to the business community who have supported us over the years. But the main thing is to give a good performance; it's 1971 since we beat Dublin in the championship."