WATERFORD manager Derek McGrath was delighted his ‘hard working’ team were rewarded with Allianz Hurling League glory on Sunday.
“I’d be lying if I said I envisaged being here,” McGrath said following the triumph over Cork at Semple Stadium.
McGrath was heavily criticised in Waterford at the end of last year, but his young side have responded in style.
“I think what we tried to do was ride out the storm, ride out all the criticism that was there after the changes were made to the panel, keep our heads down and try to change as a management in terms of sensitivity.
“The way we’ve dealt with system-talk… we just felt we needed to change things, tweak things, to be successful based on the group of players we have. If you were in the 2004 Munster final, you had a forward line of Seamus Prendergast, John Mullane, Eoin Kelly, Paul Flynn, Dan Shanahan.
"I think Waterford will be at a stage to play more open hurling in a year or two — it’s not as if it’s not a plan; we feel we have a plan in place.
“We were building confidence by being relatively, I won’t say defensive, hard-working. We, or someone else, will tweak it in years to come. There will be a forward line capable of flamboyance in Waterford in a few years when the likes of Patrick Curran, Shane Bennett and those are the leaders of the team.”
Widely regarded as an innovative coach McGrath wants Waterford to ‘improve’ further ahead of the Munster Championship.
“I’m not going to be a hypocrite and say we’re ready to win a Munster Championship. There are huge improvements to be made. I’ll reference the first point I made, which was when will that flat day be?
"How we react to that will tell and that’s looking ahead. I think it’s a classic case of the Clare-Cork scenario from two years ago when Cork were waiting for Clare two years ago in Limerick; that’s what we face in five weeks time.”
