For, me the summer doesn’t begin properly until I’m bumper-to-bumper in traffic outside Thurles, hearing cries of “apples, oranges and chocolate” and then having the hair on the back of my neck stand up with the burst from the public address: “A chairde, cuirigí failte foireann i gcontae an ...”

I can’t wait for Sunday and Semple Stadium. Tipp and Cork in the Munster hurling championship is the perfect starter to any year – regardless of the result.

Being from the Banner county – an occasional rival to both – the result won’t bother me, although hand on heart, I’d like to see them both beaten!

I’ll have to side with the Rebels, however, I do not see a way for them to dethrone the Munster and All-Ireland champions.

Whatever subliminal thoughts of complacency that might have been rattling around Tipp heads were taken care of by the hammering at the hands of Galway in the league final.

This Tipperary team will take the field primed to restake their claim as the finest team in the land.

The league final was likely just a blip, although it will have given other heavyweights (like Waterford) the blueprint to beating Tipp.

Cork aren’t in the heavyweight conversation these days, but hopefully their supporters will still travel and give this occasion the Munster championship feel that makes such afternoons so special.

However, when that championship electricity courses through Semple Stadium, anything can happen.

The traditionalists in both counties will be quick to point out the numerous times each has caught the other on the hop, but apart from 2010, Tipperary have won seven of the eight contests in the last decade. This team have Cork’s measure and there is very little to suggest that Cork can score enough or, more pertinently, hold the Premier attack to a manageable total.

The champions have a balance to their side that few counties can match, even if the league final suggested otherwise. That day saw almost all of the team flat and off the pace, something that can be excused once it doesn’t become a habit. If anything, it will have concentrated minds and served as a wake-up call. We won’t see that same Tipperary performance this weekend.

I’d consider Cork staying within six or seven points as a reasonable result for them, as sacrilegious as that must sound to Rebel supporters and certain GAA traditionalists. However, the evidence of our own eyes for two years now is all the proof we need.

To beat the All-Ireland champions when it matters, to beat any serious team in championship you have to go for the jugular and Cork have lost this habit.

This is one glaring deficiency that Cork have been slow to address. In their last four meetings with Tipp they have scored just a single goal.

Take for example, just two of their undoubtedly talented forwards – Patrick Horgan and Alan Cadogan, serious players that would be an asset to plenty of county sides. Horgan has played eighteen championship games in the last four years, most at full forward, and scored just one goal from play. It was a crucial one to win his county an All-Ireland semi-final, which came when he dispossessed the Dublin keeper Gary Maguire but was a gift rather than a clinical finish.

You see where I’m going here. In six matches, Cadogan has yet to trouble the man with the green flag.

In far too many crucial outings Cork have failed to rattle the net.

Watch on Sunday when a Cork forward breaks the first tackle, or has daylight in front of them. Their first instinct for a while now has been to veer away from goal to throw the ball over the bar. It’s an easy out all the time.

Kilkenny didn’t win all their titles by taking the easy score when offered. They would keep going, release the man inside, sometimes take the hit, sometimes not get the green flag, but they would go for it.

To me, this has been one of Cork’s greatest failings in recent times – they simply do not appear to have the ambition needed at this level. This was never the Cork way in the seventies, eighties or nineties.

The Tipp half-forward line have no compunction about taking the extra step and on Sunday I expect them to run at Cork early and often. If there are goals on, they will get them. Quiet against Galway, the McGraths, Bubbles and Bonner will be different animals now. Welcoming Seamus Callinan back into the mix will also undoubtedly help.

I hope that this is a contest to the end. Should Kieran Kingston and the Cork followers instill the same belief and work rate that the Tribe threw at Tipp, maybe it will be. But I think not. Tipperary to get to a Munster semi-final with confidence levels restored.

Big Ball

We also have a busy weekend in the football championship.

All known and recent form suggests that Mayo will easily account for Sligo in Castlebar, while Monaghan will do the same to Fermanagh in Clones and Donegal for Antrim in Ballybofey. There is always the possibility, mind you, that at least one of these games might prove a scare for the hot favourites. Probably Mayo!

In Leinster, they are busy with three games to be played out by the current minnows of the province, (let’s face it, there’s 11 of them at this stage).

Louth and Wicklow in Parnell Park is the easiest to call because the Wee County are now a proud Division 2 team, buoyed by an impressive league campaign, while Wicklow are on a par with London. Not good for the Gardeners. Louth to win with ease.

Laois and Longford could make for decent highlights for the welcome return of The Sunday Game. Close in the league, there won’t be much between them in Portlaoise – maybe Longford’s recent pedigree might have them revved up for this summer. They beat Monaghan and Down in the qualifiers last year. Wins like that instill belief and leave a taste for more.

Carlow and Wexford were both contenders for Division 4 promotion, the Yellowbellies just pipping their neighbours to go up a flight. Home advantage though might see Dr Cullen Park celebrating on Sunday evening. Wexford could still have a long summer ahead with the smaller ball.

It’s a decent start to the championship and the twelve counties involved on Saturday and Sunday will be talking about nothing else all week.